


The Child of Azkaban

by LonelyHarvest



Series: The Quiet Ones [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Book 1: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Gen, Harry Potter in Azkaban, Harry Potter was Raised by Other(s), Harry Potter was Raised by Sirius Black, Harry vs. Diagon Alley, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Murder, Implied/Referenced Torture, Parselmouth Harry Potter, Ravenclaw Harry Potter, Sensory Sensitivity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-05-29 07:19:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 20
Words: 99,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15068012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LonelyHarvest/pseuds/LonelyHarvest
Summary: Being in the middle of a dangerous war meant having to plan ahead for the worst case scenario, as both James and Lily Potter very well knew. And as such, they placed powerful safeguards to ensure their son Harry would grow up with proper guardians should anything happen to them.…in their defence, neither of them would have ever expected what would happen to one Sirius Black after their deaths.





	1. The Northern Tower

Somewhere unspecified in the North Sea sat an island that was always cold.

It wasn’t a particularly big island, and you’d never see it on maps or just passing by on a boat. In fact, less than an eighth of the world’s population even knew it existed, and even less than that would ever want to visit.

For built upon that island was Azkaban prison, and if the dozens of unstable magical prisoners within didn’t put you off, the sheer number of dementors guarding it certainly would.

Contained within an impressive array of magical wards and barriers, the prison was made up of an eclectic number of buildings that varied in size, shape and purpose scattered all over the small landmass… impenetrable stone spires warded to the teeth with spell after spell, deep cell filled pits dug into the loamy soil that rarely saw sunlight, foreboding brick shaped buildings where dementors roamed freely… and each and every one of these structures was deliberately difficult to reach unscathed, even with magic.

One of the most isolated (and therefore the highest security) of these buildings was commonly known as the northern tower. Tower, for it took the shape of a tall, hollow spire and northern, for it stood at the northernmost point of the island at the top of a narrow cliff surrounded by the vicious, churning ocean.

This tower was also known as the Death Eater block, after the specific type of inmate that had been contained within. Every convicted follower of ‘you-know-who’ now resided there, and for the most part had been left to rot under the tender mercies of the dementors. Human guards only ever visited them for their yearly records and security rounds.

The only two outside visitors ever to come to that lonely spire had been Mr and Mrs Crouch years before, and not a single other witch or wizard had expressed an interest since… that is, until today.

“Are you sure about this Dumbledore?” Minister Fudge asked in a trembling voice.

The small man was twisting his bowler hat in his hands, looking remarkably pale despite the phoenix patronus making its rounds around the small group of people gathered by the ministry floo access.

The circular fire-pit was open to the freezing air (to presumably prevent the floo from staying lit for too long) on the roof of the squat ministry administration building by the southern shore, giving the four person party a clear view of the ominous tower over on the other side of the island.

It was quite a colourful group mind you, containing the likes of veteran auror Alastor Moody, the Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge, the head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement Amelia Bones and the headmaster of Hogwarts himself, Albus Dumbledore.

The white bearded old wizard in particular looked uncharacteristically grave, dressed in what were probably the least vivid robes he’d been spotted in in years (considering these robes were various shades of orange, that was saying a lot), and he merely nodded decisively in answer to the minister’s inquiry rather than responding aloud.

“The guards aren’t here to greet us. Typical,” Moody said gruffly, his false eye spinning in its socket to look down through the building below. “Probably just lit the fire and scarpered right back inside, the cowards,”

“Well I have to say that if I was in their position, I wouldn’t want to face us either,” Madam Bones pointed out. “Dumbledore, if what you’re saying is true, this could be perhaps the single greatest oversight of justice committed since the war with you-know-who, and the ministry appointed guards will be the first blamed,”

“Serves them right if they aren’t doing their bloody jobs properly,” Moody growled.

“N-now look here Mr Moody,” Fudge stammered out, trying to sound firm. “The human guards here simply cannot afford to constantly patrol the whole island, the logistics would be a nightmare, not to mention the long term effects of dementor exposure-,”

“Alastor, Cornelius, calm yourselves,” Dumbledore quietly interrupted, cutting off the presumably long worn argument before it could start anew. “We have an investigation to complete,”

With minimal grumbling, the three wizards and one witch descended into the administration building, out of the freezing wind and into the relatively warded comfort that was the only dementor-free building on the island.

In the hallways were numerous wizards and witches who served as guards and record keepers for the prison, all of whom passed the group by with bowed heads and hurried steps. As the only members of the group who were familiar with the prison layout, Moody and Madam Bones took the lead as they made their way to the records room, where the auto-updating files on each and every prisoner was kept.

For being on an island plagued by upwards of three-hundred dementors year round, the records room was surprisingly cosy and well lit. A young wizard with a nervous tick in his eyebrow awaited their arrival at a modest desk stacked with various papers.

He spoke quietly with Madam Bones for a few moments, before disappearing into the stacks of file-laden shelves behind the desk to recover what they’d asked for. The scratching of enchanted quills and the shuffling of parchment was all that could be heard in the otherwise silent room as they waited.

“Are you SURE Dumbledore?” Fudge asked again after an agonising five minutes with no sign of the young wizard returning from the records.

“The charms we use for addressing enrolment letters at Hogwarts are difficult to fool,” Dumbledore murmured, as a muffled ‘ah-ha!’ could be heard from the records shelves. “And considering the evidence we found in the wills this morning… well, suffice to say I sorely regret we did not notice him missing from the home we’d chosen sooner,”

The young wizard re-emerged from the shelves triumphantly clutching an older looking file in his arms, placing it on a clear spot on the desk for the four visitors to crowd around it before hurriedly retreating.

This was it.

This would be the proof of whether or not coming here had been in vain.

The file looked identical to any other in the room at first, that is dusty and barely touched by human hands, but when Madam Bones tentatively opened the cover…

Moody swore. Madame Bones gasped. Minister Fudge actually fainted, dropping unceremoniously to the floor. And Dumbledore’s brow furrowed darkly.

Dumbledore drew a single envelope with an address written in green ink from his robes, and laid it next to the sheet of parchment where a set of near identical words were written in black.

**‘Mr H. Potter’**

Name: Harry James Potter

**‘Cell 12’**

Cell No: 12

**‘The Northern Tower/Death Eater Block’**

Block: Northern Tower/Death Eater (Maximum Security)

**‘Azkaban Prison, the North Sea’**

Incarcerated: 12th February 1982

\-------

“Harry Potter in Azkaban… The Prophet is going to eviscerate us all,” Fudge moaned as they slowly made their way towards the tower on the north side of the island.

The fact the little group was currently being escorted by three dementors and had only Dumbledore’s patronus between the four of them wasn’t exactly helping the recently revived minister’s despairing mood.

“Since 1982… 1982! Nine years! He would have only been two years old! Merlin knows how he’s survived for so long…,” Fudge lamented, scrubbing his hands over his eyes mournfully. “If I hadn’t seen the records myself I still wouldn’t have believed it… How could the ministry have missed this?!”

“Easy,” Moody gruffly sighed, false eye for once dead still and fixed upon the tower ahead. “The Azkaban records system is mostly automatic, nobody would have noticed Potter’s papers being filed if they weren’t the ones who authorised them. Add in the overreliance on dementor guards and it would be easy for a kid to be overlooked in a crowd of inmates. And he would have only been one and a half at the time, not two,”

Fudge audibly wailed at this and Moody, getting more uncomfortable by the second, eventually had to smack the minister to get him to stop before their dementor escorts got any funny ideas.

“What I don’t understand, beyond HOW he bloody got here in the first place, is WHY Mr Potter was recorded as a prisoner rather than immediately being removed to ministry care!” Madam Bones gritted out, her expression sour and angered. “I suppose if it was a dementor who entered him into the system rather than a wizard… but even then it shouldn’t have-!”

“That is undoubtedly what happened,” Dumbledore gravely interrupted before the head of the DMLE could start her third rant of the hour. “The Death Eater block is the most heavily guarded of the high security sections; it would be fortunate to see even one human guard a year for a routine security sweep from what I saw of the records. It would have been easy enough for a clever dementor to hide away the existence of a new soul on the island… the temptation would likely have been too much for the creatures to resist,”

“Think of it this way minister,” Moody said awkwardly to the still sniffling wizard. “It could have been worse. If Potter hadn’t been registered in the files he wouldn’t have even gotten food or clothing from the prison stocks, and without the evidence in the records I doubt we would have gotten probable cause to even visit, let alone get him out-,”

“Moody, you’re not helping,” Madam Bones grimaced as Minister Fudge seemed to deflate even further at these words. At least he wasn’t actually crying anymore.

They continued to walk in silence after this, passing by the low and medium security buildings along a booby-trap ridden pathway that only dementors (by virtue of not actually needing to touch the ground) could easily move across.

There were glyphs, runes and wards woven into the cracked paving stones that could incapacitate or even kill if activated, not to mention the natural hazards of the wild and hardy plant life that swamped Azkaban’s less-built-up areas. And the less that was said about the various creatures living in said plant life, the better.

They had to tread very carefully if they wanted to make it to their destination intact, and their dementor guides were only marginally helpful in that task. No wonder there’d never been a successful escape attempt from this place.

“Let us focus on the future rather than the past,” Dumbledore eventually said as they drew even closer to the high security areas of the prison. “There is nothing we can do about the circumstances that led to this tragedy except fight to prevent them from occurring again-,”

“-not bloody likely that, Lily and James didn’t share the exact incantation of that spell with the rest of us, more trouble than it was worth-,” Moody muttered.

“-and perhaps more importantly, we need a plan of action to rehabilitate young Harry,” Dumbledore concluded, ignoring Moody’s grumblings. “He’s been surrounded by Death Eaters and dementors for most of his life, and there’s no way we can tell how that might have affected him,”

This statement drew another long silence from the group. There was a team waiting at St Mungo’s on standby of course, had been ever since they’d discovered that file less than an hour before… but there was no precedent for this. The long term effects of dementors on adult wizards were well known, but on a child whom had been in their presence since the age of two?

Even if they disregarded the inhuman prison guards, they still had the prisoners whom had been around Harry to consider… from the looks of things, the boy would have been in close contact with Sirius Black himself! It was a small wonder he hadn’t been outright murdered!

None of them said it, but all four members of the little group were a little frightened of what they might find in the tower at the top of the cliff before them. The only sure thing they knew was that Harry (thankfully) wasn’t dead. The prison records would have automatically updated to say so if he was.

But considering what nearly ten years in Azkaban did to adult wizards and witches, it was a real possibility that the state the boy might be in now could be considered worse than death.

“I find myself suddenly in agreement with the minister,” Moody abruptly broke the silence. “The Daily Prophet really is going to eviscerate us all,”

\-------

Azkaban was a truly unpleasant place for human beings, no matter whether you were a guard, a temporary inmate in a holding cell or a documented prisoner in any level of security.

It was constantly cold, a lingering sense of despair followed even those furthest removed from the dementors, and a large number of cells (especially those in the higher security areas) were exposed to the elements… and therefore the frequent bouts of rain, sleet and hail that blew in from the North Sea.

It wore people down over time, and even short visits to low security areas could leave marks for days or weeks afterwards on the hardiest of wizards and witches.

Which was why most of the little group FINALLY approaching the northern tower was already starting to flag with both mental and physical exhaustion, after only a few hours in the cursed prison. Only Dumbledore, fuelled by his patronus and some kind of righteous determination, seemed to still be standing tall as the four of them reached the narrow plateau of rock just before the gates of the spire.

Madam Bones had activated the small communication mirror the human guards had given them before they set off and was in the midst of alerting the administration to their safe arrival. Moody merely stood stiffly, looking up at the five storey tall spire with an impassive expression even as his false eye whirred erratically. Meanwhile Minister Fudge meekly kept his distance from all of his companions as their dementor escorts broke away to go and open the imposing barred gates ahead.

“Have you ever visited the tower yourself?” Dumbledore asked the minister conversationally, but there was a hard undertone to his voice.

“Er, well as Minister for Magic I have the authority to accompany the guards on their security rounds, but I’ve never really had the time for such things,” the Minister awkwardly replied, gazing nervously at the heavy gates now slowly creaking open. “I was planning on a visit in a couple of years for the public’s sake…,”

“In other words, we’ll be going in completely blind,” Moody growled irritably, false eye whizzing about in its socket. “Even I can’t see clearly through walls that thick,”

“Not completely blind,” Madam Bones curtly reassured them, slipping the compact communication mirror back into her robes as she re-joined the group. “Smithers back in administration pulled the patrol and discipline records from the regular dementors on duty for the tower and gave me a rundown of what to expect- from the prisoners at any rate,”

“Let me guess,” Moody said sarcastically with an emphasised roll of both his eyes. “The Death Eaters are the most dangerous crooks on this whole island, keep your wands close-,”

“Actually, it appears pretty much every inmate in the Death Eater block are currently on their best behaviour,” Madam Bones interrupted, drawing surprised looks from all three of the wizards before her. “There’s been no in-fighting at all for the last three years, and only the occasional report of trouble from the Lestranges or Black in the years before that. Technically, they’d all be free to walk around the building at this time of day if they chose,”

This statement rose several eyebrows. It was well known that after a consecutive year in Azkaban, an individual’s sanity rapidly began to deteriorate. All the inmates in this building (including, worryingly, Harry) had been here at the very least for eight years in a row.

The idea that any of them were well behaved enough to be allowed to leave their cells, or would even WANT to considering the frankly alarming number of dementors assigned to this building, sounded highly unlikely.

There was a loud clang (making the Minister jump in alarm) as the gates to the northern tower hit the walls behind them, swung open fully yet not at all invitingly. The three dementors that had escorted them this whole way flanked the dark passageway within, silently beckoning to their guests.

Minister Fudge audibly gulped in apprehension as they all reluctantly started forward.

“I have a really bad feeling about this Albus,” Moody muttered, slipping back into his Order of the Phoenix mind-set as his paranoia rightly grew.

“You always have bad feelings about things Moody!” Minister Fudge hissed.

“With all due respect Minister, I find myself sharing Moody’s feelings in this case,” Madam Bones murmured. “Good behaviour from ex-Death Eaters after this long in Azkaban? I trust Smithers, but that doesn’t change the fact that something doesn’t add up here,”

“Maybe they’re all catatonic by now… perhaps?” Minister Fudge nervously suggested, eyes flicking around at the dementors as they passed.

Dumbledore had stayed ominously quiet during this exchange, phoenix patronus settling firmly onto his shoulder. They’d all reached the passageway by now, passing into the darkness with only its silvery light to show the way.

For what felt far too long for the supposed length of the passage, they walked in shadows.

And then the hazy light returned as they entered the courtyard in the centre of the northern tower, the cloudy sky reappearing as a distant circle high above their heads.

The tower was hollow, row upon rows of cells lining the upper walls sloped to fit the great winding staircase that circled nearly up to the top. At least a dozen more dementors floated by the cell doors, silently keeping watch.

Most everything here were shades of grey and black, from the stones making up the walls and the paving on the ground to the perpetual clouds above…

…

…

Except for the entirely inexplicable sight of delicate brown branches, pale green leaves and anaemic red fruits.

A cherry tree, in the centre of the courtyard.

Pale, twisted and faded looking perhaps, yet most definitely a cherry tree.

Growing through the paving stones, a cherry tree, in the middle of one of the highest security areas of Azkaban, a cherry tree.

So out of place was this sight after the near constant gloom and grey that characterised the rest of the island, all four members of the visiting group stopped dead upon spotting it.

And it took even Moody more than a moment of utter bafflement to notice to figure sitting up against the cherry tree’s hardy trunk.

\-------

Meanwhile, during the party of four’s adventures in getting to the northern tower and presumably the missing boy who-lived, Florian Mulciber had been meditating underneath said cherry tree.

He’d been meditating calmly for that whole morning thus far, alternately letting his mind wander into nothing, solving simple mental puzzles to quiet his thoughts and strengthening his long worn occlumency shields.

Thoughts and feelings passed him by one by one, never lingered on for long. They were but hazy memories of a grand and difficult time in the past full of hopes and regrets.

(It was sometimes hard to tell them apart)

Florian had just achieved a state of meditation almost akin to that of a deep relaxing sleep, something unfortunately difficult to come by in Azkaban, when he’d abruptly had a stick jabbed in his throat and been forced to open his eyes.

Now, considering the presence of the stick-bearing tree above him, nearly anyone in the tower could have perpetuated the deed. Personally, at the time he’d suspected either Raleigh or Sirius, and was good and ready with a few choice words for breaking his concentration.

But seeing Mad-Eye Moody looking down on him with an utterly furious expression on his face was close to the last thing he’d expected, more so that the stick currently jabbed in his throat was a WAND.

(It had been years since he’d last seen a wand, much less his own…)

“Ah, Mr Mulciber, we were wondering if you could possibly answer a few questions of ours…,” Albus (freaking!) Dumbledore said from Moody’s left, and Florian felt his jaw drop open as he spotted not only the Minister for Magic but also the head of the DMLE standing off to the side, flanked by a frankly unnecessary number of dementors.

There were many things Florian could have said, yet the first words out of his mouth were:

“What took you so long?!”


	2. Cell 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The search for Harry continues... but the inmates of the northern tower of Azkaban are not exactly as the visitors were expecting them to be. Whether this is for the better or worse remains to be seen.

Each cell in the Death Eater block was built to be practically identical.

Each one was approximately two metres cubed in dimensions, with a single barred window facing out of the tower and a large iron lattice on hinges that served as a door facing onto the stairs within.

There was a small pit in the corner of each cell that vanished any non-living contents deposited inside, meant to serve as a toilet, and a slightly raised stone platform on the opposite side of the room, meant to serve as a space to sleep off of the damp paved ground.

…and of course, in each and every cell there were a number of iron manacles and chains firmly bolted into the masonry walls, meant for the most unruly and maddened of prisoners.

However, beyond those universal features, the scant amount of items and belongings in each cell of the northern tower varied considerably.

There were items of improvised furniture made from carefully harvested cherry wood, tattered scrolls and notebooks likely… er, ‘gifted’ by the guards for good behaviour (because how else would they have found their way into this isolated area of the prison?), handmade quills and sticks of charcoal packed up neatly in rat leather pouches, tattered prison issue blankets repaired time and again with improvised needles…

But beyond all of that, what was by far the most eye catching (and unnerving) feature of the cells Dumbledore, Moody, Bones and Fudge passed on their trip up the tower staircase was how all the inmates residing within them were behaving.

SANE.

For though the prisoners’ physical appearances were universally gaunt, pale and sickly looking, behaviour wise most of them appeared just as sane- and in some notable cases, somehow even SANER- than they had been all those years ago while in the service of you-know-who.

Seeing Florian Mulciber (a dangerous Death Eater whom specialised in the mind arts and had been indicted for twenty-six separate uses of the Imperius curse) meditating calmly under the strange cherry tree in full sight of no less than five dementors had been the first great surprise upon entering the tower-

(-‘what took you so long?’ the Death Eater had asked almost accusingly, in a voice that had neither screamed in madness nor shook with fear.

Shocked, no member of the visiting group had answered him.

Forgetting their own questions in the face of such a jarring inquiry, the four visitors had simply backed away slowly from the once-dangerous wizard and continued on their way.

Moody had been reluctant to take his wand off Mucliber’s throat… but the man had done nothing but stare after them in confusion as they retreated up the stairs-)

-but as they quickly discovered, it was far from the last.

As they’d walked by cell 02, they’d seen Donnell Jugson (a wizard Moody had personally arrested in the act of torturing a muggle family in their own home, and was suspected of far worse atrocities) sitting quietly playing DICE of all things with none other than Antonin Dolohov (the only living member left of the group that had murdered Fabian and Gideon Prewett, amongst who knew how many others).

Neither man had so much as raised their voices at the group’s passing, merely giving ambivalent nods in return to Moody’s incredulous stare, and promptly returning to their game the instant the visitors moved on.

A few dozen stone steps later, in cell 06 they spied Augustus Rookwood (someone Madam Bones had personally worked with as a liaison to the Department of Mysteries before he’d been convicted of selling its secrets to you-know-who) locked in a heated debate with Raleigh Gibbon (another one of Moody’s arrests for muggle killing) and Rabastan Lestrange (one of those responsible for torturing the Frank and Alice Longbottom to insanity) over whether or not he’d really changed his name from Algernon in his youth.

The fact the latter two inmates were smiling and chuckling in the face of the former’s irritation… in the presence of THREE DEMENTORS, was perhaps the most unnerving sight Madam Bones had ever seen and she’d been involved in some of the DMLE’s bloodiest cases for upwards of two decades.

It was undoubtedly strange, just how… normal… all of these murderers, traitors, torturers and spies were acting after so long in Azkaban. In fact, the higher the four visitors climbed, the stranger the inmates’ relaxed behaviour seemed to get, until even the paradox of the cherry tree in the courtyard paled in comparison.

For example, the extremely peculiar sight they witnessed when passing by cell 09. The well-known victim of the ‘Black Madness’ Bellatrix and her estranged husband by arranged marriage Rodolphus (both Lestranges hated ringleaders of the group that had tortured the Longbottoms) had been waltzing lovingly together to an unheard tune and oblivious to all but each other. By this stage even the ever-wise and understanding Dumbledore was having trouble comprehending just what he was seeing.

“This is… certainly not what I was expecting when Smithers said they were on their best behaviour,” Madam Bones muttered, rubbing her eyes as the bewildering sight of cell 09 slipped away as they trudged further up the staircase. “If anything, they all seem less affected by the dementors than WE are,”

Indeed, the sheer cold and creeping despair radiating off the three cloaked creatures escorting them up the stairway was as palpable as ever even through Dumbledore’s patronus… yet earlier Edward Selwyn (a former lord rumoured to have killed far more than just the one wizard he’d been caught skinning alive during the war) had just politely walked past them down to the courtyard… displaying barely a shiver or frown in their unearthly presence.

“Could it be p-possible that y-you-know-who…?” Minister Fudge whispered weakly to Dumbledore as they passed by cell 10, containing a sleeping Death Eater on a pile of ragged blankets that only Moody identified as Phineas Travers. The murderer of the McKinnons looked so… un-murderous in sleep he was barely recognisable.

“The Dark Mark they all bear could be a factor in… this,” Dumbledore murmured contemplatively as they continued to climb. “Voldemort used a great deal of magic I am unfamiliar with in their creation. Who knows what secrets they might yet hold…?”

All three of his companions flinched at the Dark Lord’s name, but knew better than to draw attention to Dumbledore’s use of it in such a place. Although none of the Death Eaters thus far had appeared violent (in fact, hardly any of them had even glared or muttered darkly at their little group, which was more than could be said for some of their so-called ‘imperiused’ fellows on the outside), they weren’t fool enough to actively provoke them.

The visitors went abruptly silent as they passed by cell 11, empty of life.

That was Sirius Black’s assigned cell, and they’d seen no sign of the man thus far, nor of Harry. They’d already seen all of the other ten inmates in the northern tower, and they were fast approaching the end of the inhabited rooms. Only Harry’s cell plus the eight unoccupied ones above it remained, and if he wasn’t there then… who knew where the boy might have ended up?

(It was an odd day when finding a child in the depths of Azkaban prison was considered better than the… alternatives)

With Dumbledore conspicuously in the lead rather than their dementor escorts, they slowly approached the open iron latticed door to cell 12.

…

…

The cell, like all the others before it, was small, cold and lacking in any proper furnishings.

A noticeably larger pile of the standard issue blankets was neatly folded on top of the raised stone platform, and a roughly hewn wooden crate sat propped up on stones against one wall, its contents a mystery from this distance.

But none of the four visitors to the tower made much note of these items beyond the simple fact they existed… for against the far wall, under the barred window, was a massive jet black dog with pale eyes.

And curled up against the great beast’s side, intently reading from a battered notebook, was the very person they’d come all this way to find.

“Harry,” Dumbledore’s usually composed voice came out strangled and broken.

And two sets of eyes, one grey and one green, looked up.

\-------

Harry Potter was a small and skinny boy, with a thin face and bright green eyes.

His skin was remarkably pale from the lack of proper sunlight in the northern tower, making his long wild hair extremely dark in comparison… but for the long streaks of silver through the black that were unlikely to have naturally occurred.

He wore a pair of narrow rectangular glasses that looked oddly familiar to all four of the visitors present (Minister Fudge was the first to recall they looked identical to the reading pair Barty Crouch Jr. had once worn, that they’d all assumed had been buried with him) and his hair was pulled away from his face in a low ponytail, revealing a darkened scar on his forehead in the shape of a lightning bolt.

He was dressed in a smaller version of the grey Azkaban prisoner’s uniform, a simple shirt and drawstring trousers that had clearly been cut and sewn from a larger set of clothing… and weren’t quite long enough to cover the ominous looking scarring around his wrists and ankles.

(Cold burns from the iron shackles and chains in the cells were common for misbehaving prisoners in Azkaban, especially for those attended to by dementors rather than human guards. But there had been no record in Harry’s file that he’d ever been restrained as punishment…)

Harry had the same somewhat emaciated, ragged look about him that the rest of the inmates in the tower all had, but his eyes were bright and clear.

As were the grey eyes of the man that had suddenly appeared where the massive dog had been, set into the unmistakable face of one Sirius Black.

His hair, while matted and long, had clearly been cut recently to reach his shoulders rather than his waist, and while his face was pale and corpse-like there was a familiar dangerous spark in his eyes that every teacher at Hogwarts had wisely learnt to dread.

“What took you so long?” Black asked quietly, his hoarse voice resembling more the growl of his animagus form (and wasn’t that another unwanted surprise, Sirius Black was an unregistered animagus…) than the light-hearted tone from the man’s youth.

Too stunned for words, none of the four responded to his question.

“Nine years,” Black continued darkly, his arms curling possessively (protectively?) around the small boy in his lap. “Nine BLOODY years, and you finally decide to show up? Did you even KNOW where Harry was all this time?”

He tilted his head questioningly, his eyes flickering to each visitor with an increasingly sour expression until they finally landed on Dumbledore.

“What finally tipped you off, huh?” Black drawled. “The wards on dear Petunia’s house breaking? Obviously not. The fact he wasn’t enrolled in a muggle primary school? Clearly too late. Accidental magic detection perhaps? Except there’s been more incidents than I can count of that and there’s never been a response before,”

Minister Fudge opened his mouth as if to retort, but a sharp nudge from Moody silenced him before he could say something stupid. Harry’s green eyes fixed upon the movement, but he said nothing. Black’s eyes, on the other hand, were now boring into Dumbledore’s with an accusing intensity.

“Nine years, and the first inkling you have that my godson wasn’t where he was supposed to be is the address on his damn Hogwarts acceptance letter,” Black growled, the timbre of his voice dangerously low. “Am I right, Dumbledore?”

Stiffly, Dumbledore nodded, at the same time withdrawing the parchment envelope from his robes.

‘ **Mr H. Potter**

**Cell 12**

**The Northern Tower/Death Eater Block**

**Azkaban Prison, the North Sea** ’

Neither Black nor Harry reached out to take the letter from his hands.

The phoenix patronus perched upon Dumbledore’s shoulder slowly dissolved into a silvery mist and vanished as the envelope drooped between his fingers, the three dementors at the door to the cell drawing notably closer.

The breaths of every person in the room became cloudy and visible in the suddenly much cooler air, and the minister whimpered a little.

Madam Bones cleared her throat and took a step forwards.

“Sirius Black, just what is going on here?” she asked sharply, the boldness of her words not quite hiding the tremor in her voice. His grey eyes turned to her, and the ghost of a grin crossed his face.

“This? As in, why would I, a man with SUCH a reputation, possibly be acting so friendly with my own godson?” Black asked in a voice dripping with sarcasm, gesturing to the boy in his lap. “If any of you had actually met James and Lily, I’m sure you’d know. If you’d actually read their wills-,”

“Those wills were sealed under ministry orders-!” Minister Fudge squeaked indignantly, unable to keep quiet any longer.

“And were opened today under these… extenuating circumstances,” Moody gruffly cut the smaller man off, his false eye pointing out the back of his head at the slowly advancing dementors. “We know about the spell the Potters used, Black. What we don’t know is WHY,”

Black swept his gaze across the four visitors twice at this statement, first in obvious confusion, then in condescension.

“Harry is my godson,” Black said slowly, as if explaining something to a particularly dim-witted individual. “It’s my JOB to protect him if his parents aren’t there. Which is what I’ve been TRYING to do for the LAST. NINE. YEARS,”

“You’re the one whom GOT them KILLED you trai-!” Minister Fudge started to yell, but his voice suddenly seized up mid-word. He choked, clutching at his throat as empty wheezes left his mouth, drawing the attention of everyone in the room.

“Don’t say those things about Uncle Padfoot,” a soft voice with a sibilant, rasping undertone quietly spoke.

Moody and Dumbledore immediately stiffened.

Turning back into the cell, they saw little Harry Potter standing up in front of Black, leaving the notebook behind on the stone floor.

Though he barely resembled either of his parents but for the colours of his eyes and hair, the hard look on Harry’s face and the furious stiffness of his stance was all Lily. There had been many occasions during his mother’s school days Dumbledore had witnessed that exact look… Harry was protecting Black…?

Black- no, Sirius- stood up behind him with a strangely gentle expression on his face, resting a comforting hand on Harry’s shoulder.

“It’s all right pup,” Sirius wearily murmured, the earlier stoniness and venom completely gone from his voice.

“No, it’s NOT,” Harry hissed, eyes flashing dangerously as his gaze honed in on the now extremely pale minister. “They don’t know a thing about that night, and nothing about you-,”

“Harry, you’re slipping again,” Sirius calmly cut him off, seemingly unaffected by the rasping, breathless hisses that accompanied his godson’s words. “Remember what Flori always says? Control your magic, don’t let it control you… Breathe now Harry, that’s good…,”

Were it anyone else in that cell but two members of the Order of the Phoenix, perhaps the strange lilt to Harry’s voice would have been passed off as another sign of his long-term imprisonment. A side effect from long periods of silence, or from long sustained screaming.

But Dumbledore in particular had heard that kind of inflection before, across many a battlefield in the last wizarding war… in an orphanage in the thirties, decades ago…

As Harry calmed, so did the minister’s wheezing, but the air in the room was unmistakably tense. No one, not least the magically silenced minister, dared to speak as Sirius gently rubbed Harry’s shoulder while the boy calmed back down.

Until Dumbledore suddenly cleared his throat.

“I think,” Dumbledore abruptly said, speaking for the first time since his patronus had failed, letter still crumpled in hand. “There is a lot that we need to discuss,”

At the time, none of the visitors noticed how the three dementors previously escorting them had mysteriously vanished from the doorway.

And none of them noticed how it didn’t change the atmosphere of the room a single bit.

\-------

‘If you are reading this,’ the additional parchment enclosed in the sealed wills of James and Lily Potter read. ‘We are probably dead, most likely at Voldemort’s hands, and haven’t yet had time to fully explain our plans to the rest of the Order. So we ask you all, before you mourn for us, to FIRST read through this note and ENSURE our Harry’s safety. Though we know there’s already a plan for him in the event of our demise, we’ve recently created our own set of safeguards to reinforce it. We need your co-operation to ensure they work.

‘To summarise, we have created a spell of our own that we’ve cast upon Harry. (No, we aren’t telling you what the incantation is, you are NOT removing it Dumbledore-L) It will ensure, amongst other things, that Harry will grow up with proper, loving guardians in the event he is placed with (or Merlin forbid, kidnapped by) less than ideal carers.

‘Should Harry ever be deliberately harmed by those legally meant to care for him at the time, this charm we’ve created will activate. It can be as little as a slap or as much as a hex, if it is done deliberately and with intent to hurt beyond all else, the spell will recognise it and immediately declare that guardian unfit. (Legally, by the way. It was a nightmare to organise with the goblins, but I guarantee those papers will be filed officially in the Gringotts records even if the Ministry refuses to accept them. Take that Bagnold!-J)

‘Then, the charm will physically send Harry to the next living person capable of caring for him as according to the list in our wills (see the official documents in this file), alongside transferring the legal right of guardianship to said person (again through Gringotts, assuring its legitimacy even if nowhere else accepts the papers). Keep this in mind Dumbledore, as we know you will likely be the one to assign Harry’s next guardian in the event of our deaths, especially if the traitor in the Order comes to light.

‘Sirius, you are our first choice as Harry’s guardian, as you well know. This also means you will be the one he goes to first if a different assigned guardian treats him poorly. Please be prepared,’

“Know that we love you all and wish you the best in the future,” Dumbledore concluded, reading from a copy he’d made of the note they’d earlier discovered. “For Harry’s sake, I hope you will work with our wishes rather than trying to overturn them.’ Ahem, ‘that means you Albus’,”

Up in the unoccupied cell 13, Sirius buried his face in his hands, fingers numbly rubbing at his forehead.

“Of all the things to do, create a spell?” he asked weakly, more to the air than the wizard beside him. “I know Lily was a genius with charms and James did more tinkering with spellcraft than any of us, but- Harry just APPEARED that night. I don’t know how they could have possibly bypassed the Azkaban wards, but one moment I was contemplating how my life went wrong for the umpteenth time and the next I had my arms full of distraught toddler. He was crying, hungry and bruised…,”

Sirius sighed heavily, glancing up at Dumbledore standing beside him.

“Why were the Potter’s wills sealed Dumbledore?” he demanded. “If someone had bothered to read these notes a decade ago Harry wouldn’t have been stuck in Azkaban for so long!”

“And you Sirius?” Dumbledore quietly diverted, making the man beside him go stiff. “While I admit the rest of the wills were left unread in our haste after we uncovered this note, I have a feeling there may be more within that is relevant to this… situation. Even without considering that, I can tell that something went amiss with your sentencing just from your behaviour around Harry-,”

“What sentencing?” Sirius snorted. “I never GOT a proper trial Dumbledore, no thanks to Crouch senior, and considering what the world thinks of me I doubt I ever will. Though if Bones has her way I’ll be up on the stand for never registering as an animagus I’ll bet-,”

“Where I’m sure it will come to light that the original case against you has as many holes as the average sieve does,” Dumbledore calmly interrupted. “The Potters’ wills are open for public reading now, and I assure you they will be examined to the letter. Not to mention the fact that you’ve protected Harry in this place for all these years will show you in a much better light to the Wizengamot than you think,”

Sirius blinked, staring at Dumbledore with a blank expression on his face. As if he couldn’t comprehend that maybe, just maybe, he might also have justice done at last. With another heavy sigh, he shook his head wearily, turning towards the barred window.

The view was uninspiring; grey waters, dull plant-life and barren stony ground was all that could be seen from this particular window. Below them, the faint sound of voices from cell 12 could be heard, where Madam Bones was currently going over Harry’s legal situation with him regarding his imminent release. Minister Fudge and Moody had been banished to the bottom of the tower again with a re-summoned patronus from Dumbledore, alongside a blunt statement from Sirius that they would likely do more harm than good trying to talk to the boy themselves.

“Pettigrew. What about Pettigrew?” Sirius suddenly asked, sharply turning back to the old wizard. “There should be a section in the wills that will prove it, that the rat was James and Lily’s secret keeper instead of me. He’s STILL out there somewhere, probably hiding out in his animagus form. And Petunia! What about her? I know she only had Harry for a couple of months but the damage she and her husband did in that time was just- just- rrgh!”

“Pettigrew will be looked for,” Dumbledore answered carefully, seemingly mulling over these new facts as he spoke. “As soon as the evidence becomes clear, the ministry will be forced to act. As for Petunia, both the aurors and the muggle police are already looking into her for not reporting Harry’s disappearance… I myself still need to properly question Arabella to find how that could have been overlooked for so long,”

There was a short silence between the two wizards. Hesitating for a moment, as if unsure whether or not to ask his next question, Dumbledore took a cautious step towards Sirius.

“Sirius, I hate to change the subject so abruptly, but is Harry by any chance a…?” Dumbledore began to inquire.

“A parselmouth?” Sirius flatly finished for him as Dumbledore gravely nodded. “Yes, yes he is, and there’s NOTHING wrong with that. There’s so many different families married into the Potter tree it’s really no surprise that rare gifts like that pop up every few generations…,”

“Are there even any snakes on the island?” Dumbledore asked timidly, genuinely curious as well as trying to steer the conversation towards calmer waters.

“A few,” Sirius answered with a shrug. “Mostly magical sorts that can function in the cold,”

At this, a reluctant grin slowly took over the ragged man’s face as he recalled some amusing memory.

“Harry talked more to them as a toddler than he did to any human,” Sirius murmured with a nostalgic smile. “So much so that he hisses even while speaking English now. Was probably what tipped you off huh?”

Dumbledore nodded hesitantly in agreement to this, making Sirius sigh.

“Speaking parseltongue doesn’t change the fact that Harry’s a good kid, Dumbledore,” Sirius said fondly. “You know, he actually recruited some of those reptiles to snag us things that won’t be missed from the ministry headquarters’ rubbish. Damaged papers and notebooks and such… a punnet of half-eaten cherries once, and you see how that turned out,”

He jerked his head towards the cell door and the courtyard below with a sly wink, a sliver of the jubilant boy Dumbledore remembered running around with his ‘Marauders’ at school finally shining through the grave, emaciated adult Sirius had become.

“Ah… I was wondering about the tree in the courtyard,” Dumbledore said with a surprisingly genuine smile, the chill in the air seeming to recede. “I suppose some accidental magic was involved in its rapid growth and fruiting?”

And to that, Sirius actually laughed, a bark like sound that echoed through the cell and dredged away what was left of the cold ache in Dumbledore’s heart.

…it appeared that the Dark Mark wasn’t the cause of the northern tower inmates’ retained sanity after all.

After all, Sirius clearly didn’t bear it.

\-------

It was yet another strange sight that greeted the four visitors to the northern tower, the Death Eater block, as they regrouped in the courtyard that afternoon.

The strange sight namely being Bellatrix Lestrange of all people openly weeping with Harry Potter crushed in her arms like an average constrictor snake would crush a meal, surrounded by the entire combined population of the spire all waiting to say their own goodbyes.

“I’ll miss you, little one,” the woman said chokingly as she somehow tightened her hug even further, making the boy grimace.

“Aunt ‘Bella… Love you… But… can’t breathe,” Harry wheezed, tapping her arm repeatedly in an attempt to get her to let go. Eventually, she did so (much to the obvious relief of Harry’s poor lungs) but with clear reluctance on her part as she stepped back into her solemn, teary eyed husband’s arms in order to let the next person come forward.

And so they did, one after the other, each inmate displaying a frankly alarming degree of fondness for the boy whom had vanquished their master.

(Just what had HAPPENED during Harry’s incarceration in the tower?!)

“And remember Harry, what do you do before going to bed?” Florian Mulciber asked seriously, kneeling in front of Harry while looking him dead in the eye.

“Clear my mind, re-establish my walls and acknowledge but ignore the whispering,” Harry repeated in a clearly long memorised fashion.

“Good lad,” Mulciber praised with a smile. “And if you ever run into Severus, kick him for me, all right?”

“Flori!” Sirius whined dramatically from over his shoulder. “I was going to ask him that! Stop stealing my lines!”

Knowing, yet genuine, laughter bubbled out of the gathered group at this presumably regular exchange of banter between Florian Mulciber and Sirius Black, much to the continued bafflement of the now extremely dementor-weary group of visitors to the tower.

“I think we all know you’ll be following him out in a couple of months Sirius,” Mulciber said with a roll of his eyes. “You can do it yourself,”

More laughter followed that while Sirius scoffed, and though Dumbledore was the only one of the visitors who managed to smile, he also made a mental note to warn Professor Snape in advance about Black’s impending trial… and the aftermath that would inevitably follow.

After a number of similarly bewildering farewells (Rookwood had handed over several clearly handwritten scrolls to Harry and given him a fond pat on the head, Travers had given him some questionable advice about the Nott family, Selwyn had lent him his shoes for the journey across the island back to the floo, Jugson had spoken at length on the best apothecaries for student potion supplies… so on, so forth), it finally came down to Sirius’s turn.

Kneeling down, Sirius embraced Harry in a silent hug, and the boy squeezed him back hard, eyes screwed shut. Harry had a hand-sewn cloth bag made out of an old blanket slung over his shoulder containing a scant amount of belongings, but otherwise he was leaving with practically nothing.

Eventually, Sirius pulled back with tearful eyes.

“Enjoy Hogwarts, ‘kay pup?” Sirius sniffed, keeping a wobbly smile firmly in place. “If it all goes well, I might see you by the end of the school year,”

“I’ll see you then uncle Padfoot,” Harry sniffed similarly, his eyes watering openly. “The rest of you had better treat the snakes well when I’m gone! I’ll write!”

There was a chorus of affirmatives from the assembled Death Eaters, a number of whom were also trying not to openly cry.

(Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange had pretty much given up trying to hide their tears)

“We’d better make sure he gets permission for those letters to go through,” Madam Bones muttered under her breath to Minister Fudge in a vaguely threatening fashion, and the smaller man gulped and nodded in response.

And so with that the head of the DMLE came forward and put a guiding hand on Harry’s shoulder (the other three weren’t entirely sure what she’d said to him in their absence, but she remained the only one of them he allowed to touch him), turning towards the dark tunnel leading out of the northern tower.

The cherry tree, rustled by a sudden breeze, seemed to wave goodbye as the five walked between the dementors to the outside world.

For the first time in nine years, Harry Potter was leaving Azkaban.

And if the four people beside him had their way, he would never return.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who left kudos and/or commented!  
> I am glad you are enjoying the story thus far.
> 
> Next time: The Wizarding World finds out about this whole fiasco... or, as Fudge so eloquently put it, The Evisceration


	3. The Reactions... AKA The Evisceration

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Wizarding World reacts to horrifying false imprisonment of boy-who-lived!  
> Or:  
> As per usual, the media are harpies that love scandal. What. A. Surprise.

The Daily Prophet, 25th of July 1991

**_The Boy-who-Lived… through Azkaban?!_ **

_‘For the last ten years the wizarding world has been at peace, in no small thanks to one Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived. And as the day of his return to us approaches, many of our readers have been rightly asking- Where has he been all this time?_

_Rumours and theories have abounded over the past decade. Has our child saviour been living in secret with a trusted wizarding family? Or perhaps with distant relatives sworn to protect him? Or maybe even sequestered safely within the walls of Hogwarts itself? But no! Of all the speculated places the boy-who-lived may have been, of all the guesses the Daily Prophet and other publications have made over the years, none could have been further from the truth._

_For it was reluctantly confirmed by the Ministry of Magic yesterday, much to the horror of the wizarding public, that not only had the boy-who-lived NOT been with the so-called ‘loving’ family Dumbledore has often assured us he placed him with…_

_…but that he was, in fact, imprisoned in a high security block of Azkaban!_

_It may sound unbelievable dear readers, but that is the shocking truth! The question however remains… how could this have happened?_

_As the wizarding world rightly knows, after vanquishing the Dark Lord You-Know-Who on Halloween 1981, one year old Harry was taken into the care of Albus Dumbledore (OoM, 1 st class, Grand Sorc., Chf Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, member of the ICoW, Headmaster of Hogwarts, etc.) on advisement from the Ministry of Magic to be placed in a suitable home to be raised._

_Now presumably the boy wasn’t taken directly to our nation’s most notorious prison, but what happened in between then and now to force such an outcome has remained a ministry secret… and clearly not just at yesterday’s announcement._

_After all, in the years since that night, both Dumbledore and multiple ministry officials have repeatedly assured the wizarding public that Harry Potter has been ‘in safe hands with a loving family’, supposedly ‘regularly checked up upon’ and ‘doing well, far away from the bustle of the wizarding world’._

_Whether these statements were of genuinely misinformed ignorance or blatant lies to hide the imprisonment of the boy-who-lived is still unclear._

_Either way, after pressure from a number of ministry employees involved in the investigation of this horror over the past few days, Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge publicly revealed the truth yesterday evening, presumably to head off an even greater scandal should the information be leaked._

_According to ministry authorities the whole situation ‘officially’ came to light when_ _an attempt to deliver Harry Potter’s Hogwarts acceptance letter was made… and the charm written address was not what was expected. Worryingly, if this is indeed the truth, this ‘official’ story still seems to imply that NOBODY noticed the boy-who-lived was not where he should have been until the summer before he was due to return to the wizarding world!_

_(For an exclusive Prophet analysis on Harry Potter’s chances of admittance to Hogwarts this September, see page 6)_

_The Ministry of Magic vehemently denies any knowledge of the boy’s presence in Azkaban prior to yesterday’s ‘discovery’, but records prove he had been there for a shocking number of years. So if this ‘official’ story is true… then how could Harry Potter have possibly ended up in there in the first place, the Daily Prophet asks?_

_And more importantly, how could such a terrible thing have gone unnoticed by not only by Dumbledore, the so called greatest living wizard of our age, but by the entire Ministry of Magic combined for so many years?_

_Minister for Magic, Cornelius Fudge commented in his official statement: ‘We had… no idea the boy was even in the prison. All the wards and safeguards Dumbledore left reassured us he was safely… with his muggle relatives,’_

_Harry Potter was recovered from Azkaban by a team of ministry officials the day before yesterday, and is currently under treatment in a private ward at St Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. The Daily Prophet received no comment from the hospital on the state of the ten year old’s health and mental stability_

_See more on page 3…’_

\-------

The Wizarding World’s initial response is exactly what you would expect it to be.

That being primarily shock, followed quickly by disbelief, feelings of betrayal and/or blinding rage.

The admittedly ‘light on details’ article in the Daily Prophet that was the majority of the public’s first news of this horrifying event immediately spawns thousands of differing conspiracy theories… and millions of angry letters.

The Wizarding Department of Child Services, the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, the office of the Minister for Magic and a certain tower in Hogwarts castle are all bombarded with howlers and hate mail within hours of the newspaper’s release.

(In a particular house on Spinner’s End, a dour potions master looks over his morning paper and promptly chokes on his coffee)

\-------

Witch Weekly, Issue 523, 26th of July 1991

**_Deceased Heroes Auror James Potter and Order of Merlin Recipient Peter Pettigrew- Criminals!?_ **

**_Shocking Confession in Newly Unsealed Potter Wills!_ **

(The article begins with a lengthy biography of the wizards in question in the title, including short summaries of the events on the respective days they died)

_‘...both Potter’s wills were sealed under orders from the then Minister for Magic, Millicent Bagnold, with no clear reason given for the act._

_But mere days ago with the revelation that their ten year old son, Harry Potter, had been placed in Azkaban under unknown circumstances, the wills of James and Lily Potter were finally unsealed for public reading… and the reason for said sealing finally became clear._

_It was to protect the reputation of some of the Wizarding World’s most beloved deceased!_

_Within the wills was the disclosure that not only hero auror James Potter, but his long-time friend and confidant Peter Pettigrew, were hiding a shocking secret. They were both unregistered animagi of at least five years!_

_Not registering as an animagus is a serious offence. The penalty for it is cumulative depending on how long the perpetrator has gone without applying for a permit after the Ministry allowed registration period, starting with a fine of 5G per month for up to two years of non-registry, then afterwards either a fine or Azkaban sentencing equivalent to…’_

(The article goes on and on about the increasing penalties Potter and Pettigrew were avoiding, and then into the myriad of crimes unregistered animagi in the past have committed using their powers… alongside a healthy amount of gossipy speculation as to what they two might have been doing with said powers while they still lived. The fact that Pettigrew was apparently the secret keeper for the Potters instead of Black is mentioned in a footnote in the article, and therefore largely overlooked)

_‘…and not only that, the wills state that well-known traitor to the Potter family Sirius Black (currently imprisoned in Azkaban under multiple life-sentences) was also complicit to their teenage plot to becoming unregistered animagi. Witch Weekly has heard speculation of an additional trial coming up for Black to amend for this new charge._

_The last living friend mentioned in this posthumous confession is one Remus Lupin, whom while apparently not an animagus according to the wills, has some kind of other ‘furry little problem’ (quote taken directly) related to their plot. Remus Lupin has not responded to our inquiries for comment.’_

\-------

The news becomes THE hot topic for every other wizarding media outlet over the next few days, with articles appearing on everything from speculation on the current wellbeing of the boy-who-lived to the ever popular conspiracy theories as to how he ended up where he was to common gossip over the contents of the newly unsealed Potter wills.

While the Ministry (and to a lesser degree, Hogwarts) drowns in howlers and tries to scrape together some form of damage control, the rest of the world digs into the scandal of the day… and brings a few more scandals to light in the process.

(A man in tattered robes, while out looking for work, uses coins he honestly cannot afford to spend on a glossy magazine with a worrying headline. And when he notices and reads a certain footnote, the pages start to rip in his shaking hands)

\-------

The Daily Prophet, 27th of July 1991

**_Fudge Speaks Out!_ **

**_Muggle Guardians for Boy-Who-Lived Responsible for his Nine Years of Hell!_ **

_‘In a public statement in the Ministry of Magic atrium yesterday afternoon, Minister Fudge has at last revealed some of the details behind the horrifying false imprisonment of the boy-who-lived, Harry Potter._

_(Up until recently, unbeknownst to the wizarding world, Harry Potter was a long term inmate of one of the highest security blocks of Azkaban prison, having suffered nine unjust years within its cold walls from the ages of 1 to 10)_

_The most important fact the Minister revealed today was the long awaited identities of the ones who put our saviour there… who were revealed to be none other than his muggle relatives!_

_Now our readers might ask, how would muggles be able to put anyone into a wizarding prison when only the Ministry of Magic has the authority to do so?_

_The answer, according to Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge, is relatively simple._

_‘The muggle sister… of Lily Potter, was assigned as Harry’s legal guardian by Dumbledore under the assumption her blood connection to the boy would allow for powerful protective wards,’ Minister Fudge claimed in his statement. ‘But we were unaware that before her death, Lily Potter placed protections of her own that would… ensure proper guardians. As (name redacted) was not considered suitable, Harry Potter was unfortunately taken by… magic to the next person considered capable of caring for him, his once godfather Sirius Black whom was at that time in Azkaban. The rest is, sadly, history,’’_

(Names of the muggles in question have been redacted throughout this article, and large portions of quotes from Fudge seem to have been omitted to better suit the story)

_‘The Daily Prophet has looked into these claims of the Minister, and researcher Owen Kipfler can tell us that the recently unsealed wills of the Potters prove them beyond all doubt! And not only that, we were shocked to discover that the criteria the Potter’s designed to consider a guardian ‘unsuitable’, as the Minister put it, was deliberate bodily harm to Harry himself!_

_Let that sink in readers, Harry Potter was taken by magic to Sirius Black of all people at the tender age of one and a half because the muggle guardians Dumbledore placed him with ABUSED him! But was a childhood in Azkaban truly preferable to one with violent muggles, one that the Ministry should have removed him from at the first signs of friction?_

_Special reporter Rita Skeeter gained access to the medical files of the boy-who-lived (currently being evaluated in St Mungos) for us, and they detail the awful aftereffects of Azkaban upon his young body including:_

_‘…extensive scarring caused by repeated cold burns and chafing on all four limbs, especially around the wrists and ankles where cuffs would have been placed… further scarring caused by chains wrapped around upper limbs from wrist to shoulder… underweight, with ribs and spine visible… multiple vitamin and mineral deficiencies… discolouration of hair and skin due to magical stress,’_

_As for his mental state, the records our reporter uncovered do not say, though visitors passing through St Mungo’s whom have seen Harry Potter reported him as unusually quiet and disliking company, often mysteriously disappearing if approached too openly._

_Also revealed yesterday was that Sirius Black, supposed traitor to the Potters and follower of You-Know-Who, is in fact officially Harry Potter’s legal guardian*!_

_(*As filed by the goblins of Gringotts under his deceased parents orders)_

_Even though the Ministry for Magic never accepted their copy of the documentation of this fact, magical law experts say that the guardianship is completely above board and will be hard to contest… even though the guardian in question currently resides in Azkaban himself!_

_Minister Fudge has announced that a new trial will be held for Black in November in light of a series of revelations on top of his apparent legal guardianship of the boy-who-lived, including the discovery of notes in the unsealed Potter wills that suggest he may not have been the one whom betrayed them after all…_

_‘Black’s initial imprisonment was… suspicious,’ Minister Fudge claimed. ‘Records of his original trial have disappeared, in a fashion that suggests… tampering. In addition, despite his supposed guilt in betraying the Potters to he-who-must-not-be-named, he did his best to keep their son Harry from harm during their mutual terms of imprisonment… many say a Death Eater wouldn’t do that. Many at the Ministry agree… his sentence should rightly be evaluated again,’_

_But what of the muggles that hurt the boy-who-lived in the first place, the Daily Prophet asks? What of Dumbledore, and the assigned ministry officials whom were meant to be regularly checking on his wellbeing, yet so obviously did not? Surely they too should see wizarding justice for their actions in harming Harry Potter?_

_‘The muggle relatives… of Harry James Potter are under investigation by their own authorities,’ Auror Dawlish, of the DMLE, told the Daily Prophet in an unsatisfying answer to our first question._

_Unfortunately, Dumbledore was unavailable for comment on the rest._

_See more on page 5._

_For the details of Sirius Black’s alleged crimes, see page 3.’_

\-------

The amended story that appeared in the Daily Prophet two days after the initial breaking of the news did not help with the Ministry’s hate mail problem as much as they’d hoped.

The idea that the precious boy-who-lived was left with abusive muggles? That magic itself seemingly considered Azkaban the better option? That Sirius bloody Black was Harry Potter’s actual legal guardian and might have also been falsely imprisoned to boot?!

Well…

On the bright side, it did curb some of the wilder conspiracies that have been popping up… like the one that theorised Death Eater sympathisers in the Ministry had somehow managed to get baby Harry charged with the murder of the Dark Lord and had been hushing up his incarceration ever since.

(A furious Scottish transfiguration professor comes storming into a certain tower office with a newspaper crushed in one hand and an enraged ‘I told you so’ on her lips.

She stops dead however, when she sees the headmaster sitting miserably at his desk with a stack of letters three times his height before him, several shrieking red papers buzzing around his ears and a black eye most likely from a hexed missive)

(She begrudgingly helps him clean up his office instead. The man had clearly already been berated for his mistakes several times over)

\-------

The Quibbler, August Edition (Early Release) 1991

**_How to Become Immune to Dementors: A Study of the Death Eater Block in Azkaban_ **

(The article begins with a short recap of the recent events concerning what is now being widely referred to as the ‘boy-who-lived-through-nine-years-of-Azkaban’ scandal… though with an unusual number of references to obscure magical creatures dotted through it)

_‘…the incredible fact that Harry Potter emerged from Azkaban relatively unscathed. The Quibbler believes this is thanks to the aid of the witches and wizards within whom have achieved total immunity to the emotionally draining effects of dementors and the copious amount of vicious wrackspurts that nest around them._

_Known in the wider community as convicted Death Eaters, their methods are likely connected to that of the deceased Voldemort, whom once notably allied with the dementors in the last wizarding war. However, here in the Quibbler we’ve researched a few less evil ways to withstand dementor auras for our readers to try, detailed below right after our exposition on the more ‘questionable’ methods the Death Eaters may have used…’_

(What follows is a startlingly accurate account of the mental states of the Death Eater prisoners contained in the northern tower, which of course, because it’s the Quibbler, are completely ignored by all but the magazine’s most devoted readers and those ‘in the know’ at the Ministry- who promptly panic about a potential information leak.

However the, er… speculation of how the prisoners may have remained so sane that follows is a little more circumspect and vague, mentioning unspeakably evil rituals that by definition, of course, they can’t speak about, and even hint at some kind of cannibalism. And some of the ‘less evil’ suggestions they prescribe for their readers to try are just downright weird…)

_‘…that the only ‘confirmed’ defence is a corporeal Patronus charm, but any former NEWT defence student would know how difficult it is to perform said charm, let alone keep it active for an extended period of time, and that’s WITH a wand._

_So the Quibbler suggests emulating the charm in a less magically active way, like wearing the colour silver and keeping totems of your Patronus animal with you. (Simply choose your favourite animal if you are not certain of your personal patronus form!)_

_The wood of the maple and cherry trees are ideal to help ward off even the most vindictive of wrackspurts, so crafting the totem out of such materials may aid in…’_

(The article goes on like this for quite some time, complete with pictures… and a disclaimer near the end warning readers not to actively go looking for dementors if they are particularly fond of keeping their soul inside their bodies)

\-------

The hate mail and howlers eased up a little at the Ministry over the next few days as the ire of the public shifted further towards Dumbledore and away from their elected officials…

…leaving them free to investigate the worrying manner in which some particular facts in the case of the-boy-who-lived-through-Azkaban had made it to the media.

After all, Rita Skeeter was never seen entering, leaving or even inside St Mungo’s… and yet the boy-who-lived’s VERY private medical records somehow ended up in her hands.

The mental acuity of the Death Eaters that the four rescuers of Harry Potter witnessed in Azkaban was publicly never spoken of, for obvious reasons… and yet the Quibbler of all publications somehow managed to discover it anyway.

So covert investigations were started…

…and then promptly put on hold ‘indefinitely’, as things related to the media usually were in the Ministry under Cornelius Fudge.

After all, the idea of annoying journalists and earning their ire has been something that had always terrified this particular administration.

(In a house fondly nicknamed ‘the Burrow’, a boy with a new prefect badge and a new owl to go with it hands off his old pet rat to his younger brother… who then promptly loses the small mammal a day afterwards, and is chastised with much yelling about irresponsibility.

The fact that the rat vanished right after news broke about Sirius Black’s potential innocence was completely a coincidence of course… wasn’t it?)

\-------

The Daily Prophet, 29th of July 1991

**_Harry Potter Will Attend Hogwarts On Time, says Dumbledore_ **

_‘After a period of complete silence on the recent Azkaban scandal involving the boy-who-lived, Albus Dumbledore (OoM, 1st class, Grand Sorc., Chf Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, member of the ICoW, Headmaster of Hogwarts, etc.) has at last released his own statement as Harry Potter’s interim magical guardian pending the trial of Sirius Black this November._

_Appearing at the Daily Prophet Head Office at noon yesterday, Dumbledore seemed to be in a subdued mood as he gave his official announcement and a short following interview. His explanation for this apparent melancholy was: ‘I will admit many of the mistakes in this case have been on my part, and they weigh heavily on me,’_

_Among other points Dumbledore made, he has formally renounced his long-term claim as a magical guardian for the boy-who-lived ‘in accordance with the wishes of Lily and James Potter’, and if Sirius Black is not judged suitable for this role in Ministry eyes by the end of this school year, he will give his interim guardianship to the next most suitable person as declared by the list in their wills._

_(The Daily Prophet notes that this is likely to be either Augusta Longbottom if she can make a claim on her daughter-in-law’s (Alice Longbottom) behalf, or Remus Lupin, followed by Minerva McGonagall, then Andromeda Tonks and then Severus Snape. Most other individuals named on the Potter’s list either died in the war or shortly afterwards, or are otherwise incapable of assuming guardianship)_

_(The Daily Prophet also notes that Dumbledore did not say whether or not the Potter’s unidentified magic or the goblins who covertly authorised the legal side of it would actually recognise this guardianship change if Sirius Black still lives at the time)_

_Dumbledore also took the time to relay an official missive from St Mungo’s, confirming that Harry Potter should be considered in good enough health to start his first year of Hogwarts a month from now, on the 1 st of September._

_‘Contrary to the unfounded opinions of some, Harry Potter is quite sane for all the time he spent in Azkaban,’ Dumbledore said. ‘He will still require nutritional supplements for some time, or so the staff at St Mungo’s have reported to me, but otherwise he will be well enough to attend school by September. The staff at Hogwarts look forward to welcoming him on the first,’_

_For the full transcript of the interview with Albus Dumbledore concerning Harry Potter, see page 7.’_

\-------

Over the course of a week, through sparsely spread facts and heaps of misinformation, through official opinions rapidly built and even more hastily discarded, the story spreads through the Wizarding World with great speed.

Letters and howlers alike ease off after the initial ‘witch hunt’ (pardon the expression) runs out of steam in the face of both the Ministry and Dumbledore’s own damage control, and life returns to relatively normal.

Except that now every witch and wizard in Britain (and a great number outside of it), know that the boy-who-lived has done the impossible once again.

He was a child that grew up in Azkaban, and he survived.

(In the secluded corner of an international portkey office somewhere in Europe, a trembling man reads aloud from an old copy of the Daily Prophet dated the 25th of July, seemingly to himself.

…

…but the incredulous hissing laughter echoing around the empty room that follows the conclusion of his speech firmly dismisses that notion)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to everyone who commented and gave kudos!  
> For those who asked for flashbacks, there will be some small ones coming up in future chapters... and some longer ones later on... but I'm afraid you may be waiting a while for answers to the really big questions about Harry's upbringing and the mysteries around it.  
> Suffice to say it wasn't always as idyllic as what we saw when Harry was 'rescued'...  
> (I have plans for some of these reveals... 'insert maniacal cackling here')
> 
> Next time: Harry's opinion on the outside world... or, St Mungo's really needs better locks on their doors


	4. St Mungo's Hospital

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry Potter adjusts to the big wide world outside of Azkaban... which until he's considered a little healthier by his healers, solely consists of the winding halls of St Mungo's Hospital.  
> He finds things to interest him anyways.

The world outside of Azkaban was…

Bright.

Loud.

Colourful.

Fast.

Clean.

And altogether, strange.

Harry Potter wasn’t a stupid boy, not by far, but he’d always had great difficulty in imagining what might lie beyond the shores of the island he’d spent most of his life upon. Beyond the walls of the northern tower even.

Suffice to say, the real world was quite… well, different to what he’d been anticipating in his head all these years.

Of course he’d had SOME memories of the outside world to base his daydreams off, but by virtue of the dementors that had allowed their recollection in the first place, said memories had been both universally unpleasant-

( _-a tall, thin woman with a horse like face screaming at him- the strike of a meaty hand belonging to a massive moustached man- desperate pleading and high, cold laughter following a familiar scream- a flash of cursed green light-_ )

-and all made while he was under the age of two.

Harry’s entire world since then had been for the most part grey and black, cold and wet, dull and tasteless (outside of their meagre harvest of cherries, of course), and perhaps most importantly, absent of all magic but for Uncle Padfoot’s animal transformation, the hissed words of the snakes he bargained with, the descriptive words of the other prisoners and his own occasional outbursts of natural power.

…

So to say that St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries took Harry some getting used to would be a truly MASSIVE understatement.

Gone were the never-ending shades of grey and the relative silence. The walls, ceiling, floor, doors and windows of the hospital were all different colours that, while they might appear subdued to the average person, were riotous and overwhelming to poor Harry’s overworked eyes.

Half the people here wore robes coloured a painful shade of green quite unlike that of the cherry tree’s leaves, and the other half’s wear varied bewilderingly. Not to mention that they all continuously chattered so loudly that he could hardly hear himself think.

Gone was the near absence of anything magical. Harry would even go as far to say there was magic practically everywhere in the hospital, from wands being waved in nearly every hand to the discrete pops of house elves cleaning to the horrifying spell damage done to most of the other patients on the floor he was housed on.

He could almost taste the thick weave of magic around him, humming in the air in his every waking moment. It was both claustrophobic and wondrous all at once.

Gone was the tasteless, mushy gruel he’d lived on for years. The hospital food, while better by far than the standard prison fare (and debatably even better than the sweet tang of cherries he had so come to love), was both truly bewildering to Harry’s palate and overfilling of his stomach.

Even once Harry had accustomed himself to the sheer amount of choices he had available for meals, he still found he could only eat miniscule amounts at a time… much to the dismay of his healers, whom were quick to double the amount of the bitter tasting nutrition potion he had to down whenever he ate.

The only things in St Mungo’s that Harry could really say were complete and definite improvements from Azkaban were the ambient warmth of the hospital’s rooms, the readily available hot showers and the piles of thick blankets he could snuggle down inside. The icy cold of the prison was something he did NOT miss.

The people in there on the other hand…

Harry had only been in St Mungo’s for a handful of days and he was already finding himself longing for the relatively quiet company of the self-proclaimed ‘Most Loyal Death Eaters of the Dark Lord’ (…and Uncle Padfoot) in the northern tower that he’d left behind.

Occasional violent disagreement in morals and beliefs aside, Harry still missed his lessons with them. He still missed both the easy banter and the calming silence, he missed Aunt Bella and Rodolphus’s overly public displays of affection for each other, he missed the numerous snakes he’d come to befriend… heck, he even missed the ongoing prank war between Raleigh and Rabastan against Augustus (though he would freely admit that if Uncle Padfoot had decided to involve himself in it again, then he was glad to be as far away from the tower as he could be).

It was unavoidable, Harry supposed, but the people in St Mungo’s treated him… differently.

The green robed healers were both the easiest and hardest to deal with at once, for while they were usually the most professional of the people Harry came across in the hospital, they were also the ones he had to interact with the most.

There was only so many times he could hear the horrified gasps at the darkened restraint inflicted scars on his arms and legs, the saddened sighs at the prominence of his ribs and spine against his skin, and the endless exclamations about his relative sanity despite long term dementor exposure (‘oh how strong you must have been’, ‘poor little thing’, and so on, so forth) before his composure began to slip.

But the professional, if demeaning, talk of the healers was still infinitely preferable to the blubbering and nattering of the other witches and wizards constantly about.

By strict medical ruling, Harry wasn’t meant to have any ‘non-approved’ outside visitors (‘approved’ visitors being currently confined to a very short list comprising of the four individuals whom had escorted him out of Azkaban, none of whom had actually come to see him yet), but that hadn’t stopped a truly idiotic number of people from trying to see him anyway.

For example, within hours of the news of his ‘rescue’ going public there were already nearly twenty different cases of deliberate magical injury that had shown up in St Mungo’s emergency room; hopeful idiots betting on a chance they might be placed in the same ward as the boy-who-lived.

(Thank Merlin the healers had the foresight to place him in a private room)

As the days passed an increasing number of folk had started to covertly ‘search’ the hospital during visiting hours, looking out for the tell-tale Potter nameplate by his door (consequentially, it was removed by day three of this nonsense), or trying to trick his location out of the long suffering healers, medi-wizards/witches, administration staff or even the poor house elves if they could corner them.

Inevitably once his room was found, this daily parade of so called ‘visitors’ would proceed to ‘accidentally’ barge into his room brandishing quills for autographs and unwanted gifts-

(-he’d quickly learnt that the so called ‘lock’ on his door was pretty much useless-)

-whether Harry was actually inside at the time or not. It got so bad that eventually a pair of aurors were stationed at his door during the visiting hours to discourage the invaders... and after one memorable incident involving a broomstick and a broken window, they began staying overnight too.

Even with those precautions in place, random people would still accost Harry in the hallways while he was being taken to examination rooms, returning from one of his many bouts of testing or merely trying (and usually failing, due to aforementioned accosting) to do some exploring of his own.

(Harry pretty much gave up on trying to explore beyond the fourth floor after the seventh time this happened, the last behind a succession of ‘locked’ doors and in a no-wands-allowed area. The places these ‘visitors’ kept managing to get into without proper authorisation was ridiculous… never mind the fact that Harry had also been able to get into said areas with ease)

Young Harry Potter, the-boy-who-lived-through-nine-years-of-Azkaban, was quickly growing very weary of his newfound fame. Having people in the halls stop and gape at him was upsetting. Having them break into his room to mob him with thanks and pity was worse. Having to have aurors guard his door and fight off his ever increasing crowd of admirers and well-wishers during visiting hours was just sheer exhausting.

Despite the troubles the title had caused him and Sirius in his early years, Harry was starting to feel quite thankful that the boy-who-lived had grown up in Azkaban (and therefore away from the wizarding public) after all.

Even Aunt Bella wasn’t quite as crazy as some of the middle aged witches that kept trying to get in for a visit, and she’d once tried to throw him off the top of the tower staircase.

(He’d been four at the time. She’d grown less aggressive since then)

And so it was that whenever he could get away for long enough, Harry often found himself sequestering himself in the one part of St Mungo’s where he wouldn’t be bothered for hours at a time.

The Janus Thickey ward.

\-------

The Janus Thickey ward was one of the few places in St Mungo’s Harry had the opportunity to properly scout out before the waves of unwanted fans had hindered his exploration efforts.

On that very first day out of Azkaban, when Harry had been immediately swarmed by healers in green, poked, prodded, casted at, sobbed over (and hadn’t that been awkward…), washed, weighed, measured, dressed in clothes that felt far too soft to be real (pyjamas were truly a gift to mankind) and tucked away in his private room for the night, those particular doors at the end of the corridor had already stood out to him.

Looking at them he’d felt… well, Harry wasn’t entirely sure HOW to describe what he felt. It was an odd kind of calling, almost… a lure to drag him inside. And so, as eternally curious as he was, he’d snuck out of his room that night to investigate the mysterious closed ward, and been pleasantly surprised by what he found.

He’d discovered that unlike much of the rest of the hospital, this particular ward wasn’t open to the general public during regular visiting hours… and therefore overlooked by even the most zealous of his uninvited visitors. It was a simple matter for Harry to quickly ‘pick’ the lock-

(-which really only consisted of him jiggling the handle of the door until it opened. St Mungo’s REALLY needed to invest in better locks-)

-and hide inside whenever he needed to. He’d made it his refuge from the general bustle of the hospital in the days since.

And as for the patients already inside… well, they never really bothered him.

…

It was odd sometimes.

Harry would occasionally get an intense feeling of déjà vu when he sat beside Frank Longbottom to read one of the many untouched magazines on his bedside table (he’d asked permission first of course, and the slight incline of the bedridden man’s head had been good enough for Harry) or talked about Uncle Padfoot to Anges the dog faced lady (she’d dissolved into a painfully familiar series of growl-like giggles at some of the jokes he relayed) or patiently listened to the trembling mutters of the thin man in the corner with blank, white eyes (his medical sheet said John Doe… but his words said otherwise).

Sometimes, it was almost nostalgic. After all, back in his earliest memories of Azkaban, many of the inmates had been in similar states to some of these poor souls… although admittedly they’d been far, FAR more aggressive.

(And come to think of it, quite a bit more prone to going off on rants about the glorious manifesto of the Dark Lord for that matter)

Harry was uncomfortably aware that a sizable percentage of the people in the Janus Thickey ward had been put here during the war by some of the people he had befriended in the northern tower, but seeing as none of them seemed to mind his presence (and Harry was rather short of places where he could truly escape his adoring public) he squashed down the little twinges of guilt he occasionally felt and made himself at home.

By day four out of Azkaban, even the healers knew where to find him if he wasn’t in his room or wandering the halls, and were understandably reluctant to try to restrict him from the ward.

(The long-term patients, they’d reasoned, had seemed to like the boy anyway)

\-------

It took several days after his release from Azkaban before anything truly notable happened to Harry in between all the medical exams, hiding from nosy visitors and enforced bed rest.

As he often found himself those days, Harry had been in the Janus Thickey ward at the time, avoiding the public. He was perched on the edge of Alice Longbottom’s bed silently reading an old copy of Witch Weekly, his new glasses settled firmly on his nose.

(He’d kept Barty’s old glasses in his bag just in case, but the new ones were unquestionably better for his eyes. The healer that had prescribed them for him had kept pushing him to get round frames for some strange reason, but Harry had stubbornly stuck with the narrow, rectangular design he’d become familiar with)

Alice Longbottom, as silent as ever, was sitting behind him and weaving a complex braid into his black and silver streaked hair, adding pieces of brightly coloured foil here and there that he suspected might be the remains of candy wrappers.

(Harry had reluctantly agreed to get it trimmed to shoulder length by the healers the day before; any shorter and he knew it would devolve into a mass of untameable curls and spikes. But he’d flat out refused the offer to have his hair dyed to a uniform black)

The magazine was several years out of date and as such the cheap spells allowing the pictures to move were beginning to fade, but Harry devoured the articles anyway. He liked reading, and had always enjoyed pouring over the hand written scrolls and notes of his fellows in Azkaban. And now, now there was a whole world full of books out there waiting for him… which unfortunately was currently deemed off limits by the healers, who seemed determined to keep him from any further literary access in order to get him to actually rest.

So the old magazines and papers on other patients’ bedside tables had to do for now.

But even then, compared to the painstakingly crafted and therefore scare amount of reading materials in the northern tower, such a wide variety of written media (even if much of it wasn’t particularly useful or informative) was enough of a novelty to keep Harry occupied for hours at a time.

“…quite an improvement lately we think!” the chipper voice of one of the regular healers for the Janus Thickey ward could be heard approaching as Harry flipped the page on some great scandal from two years ago. “Frank’s been talking more these days, and Alice seems more aware of herself. In the last week or so I think- Oh hello there dear, I didn’t realise you’d slipped in!”

Recognising the now familiar half panicked/half kindly tone of- ‘Harry Potter somehow got into the ward again, Merlin’s beard what is the protocol for this’- Harry immediately looked up at the matronly witch…

…only to see another two individuals behind her that he’d never seen before.

An old witch wearing a long green dress and a pointed hat with some kind of stuffed bird on it (a vulture perhaps…?) who was currently staring at him like she’d seen a newly risen ghost, and a boy his age with a round face and a striking resemblance to the woman currently braiding Harry’s hair, hiding behind the bird-hatted witch.

Family then. Visitors. The first he’d seen to this ward over the almost-week he’d been here.

Feeling his face go pink with mortification Harry quickly mumbled out an apology, turning away to detangle himself from Alice’s fingers and make a hasty escape, but the old witch suddenly said-

“Is that Harry Potter?” she said incredulously, addressing the ward healer. “I had no idea he’d been placed in the permanent spell damage ward- in fact, I thought he’d been attending Hogwarts this year with Neville here. It’s his birthday today, so we came to tell his parents the good news,”

The round faced boy, Neville, also went pink with embarrassment when the old witch slapped him heartily on the back, bringing him out from where he was hiding behind her.

“Well, he’s technically in a private room for now but he somehow keeps getting in,” the healer said apologetically. “The patients seem to like him though, I hope you don’t mind Mrs Longbottom,”

“Oh no, it’s no trouble at all,” the old witch said dismissively. “Alice knew his mother in school, you know, brilliant witches the both of them…,”

By this stage, Alice had somehow managed to weave the fingers of her right hand THROUGH Harry’s half-completed braid thus foiling his attempts at escape, and was now absently gesturing to Neville with her left.

Trapped and feeling as awkward as anything, Harry’s ears quickly tuned themselves out of the adult’s conversation- because while it certainly addressed him, it was absolutely NOT addressed TO him- and after a few moments he found himself unconsciously focusing his gaze upon the boy his age.

Neville appeared to be frozen in indecision on whether or not to approach his dazed mother, whom was still holding out her hand to him in a vague ‘come here’ gesture. He looked just as awkward as Harry felt with the situation, if not more so, and he felt an abrupt surge of kinship with the poor fellow.

After a few more moments, Neville abruptly realised Harry’s eyes were on him, and they both startled a little as they made eye contact. Caught in the act of staring and racking his brains for what to do, Harry’s mind eventually fell back on one of the many etiquette lessons Aunt Bella had foisted on him.

_-‘Never be impolite to someone you’ve just met, little one’ she’d said with a firm wave of her finger. ‘It’s a mistake many prouder wizards make time and again,’_

_‘That unknown individual they snub upon first meeting could be a favoured member of a noble wizarding house for all they know,’ Bellatrix had continued seriously. ‘Or a powerful business owner, or a rising politician who could one day make their life much easier… or very difficult. A rude or hostile first impression can easily ruin a potentially beneficial future relationship. As such, the best way to go about new meetings is to simply be as polite as you can. First, greet them and introduce yourself…’-_

“Hello,” Harry said quietly as to not interrupt the adults, internally wincing at the hissing rasp ever present in his voice. “My name is Harry. What is your name?”

Neville blinked, looked up at his still talking grandmother uncertainly, and then turned back to Harry with a nervous look on his face. Considering the somewhat overbearing presence of the intimidating old witch, Harry found himself surmising the boy may not have had many chances in the past to actually introduce himself before she did it for him.

“It’s Neville,” the boy eventually said in an even quieter voice, hesitating slightly before continuing. “What are you reading?”

And Harry felt himself smile in relief.

\-------

Neville, like Harry, was a quiet boy.

Though while Harry was the kind of quiet that enjoyed curling up indoors and reading, Neville preferred the solitary quiet of the grounds and greenhouses of his family manor.

Where Harry was deathly pale, Neville’s skin was healthily tanned. Where Harry’s hair was long and black streaked with silver, Neville’s was short and blond peppered with a darker brown. Where Harry was bony and lean, Neville was rounded and stocky.

But both of them had a similar sense of shy manners, both of them shared an interest in plants and herbology (though admittedly Harry’s was more intellectual while Neville’s was more practical), both of them liked the taste of cherries (a big plus in Harry’s books), and both of them were currently trapped on the edge of Alice Longbottom’s bed with an increasing number of candy wrapper laced braids in their hair.

…this last point admittedly might have been the main reason why the two introverts had ended up talking to each other for so long upon their very first meeting.

(“Mum’s never done something like this before,” Neville had murmured with a soft grin to Harry on his right, the dozen foil woven braids through his fringe swaying as he moved. “I think it might be progress,”

“I’m glad,” Harry replied with a soft smile. “She seems like a nice lady,”)

While Harry and Neville had been growing increasingly comfortable with chatting, Augusta Longbottom (as Neville had introduced was his grandmother’s name) had relocated herself over to Frank’s bedside.

She was soon thoroughly engaged in informing him about Neville’s acceptance into Hogwarts, while keeping half an eye on the two boys next to her daughter-in-law. Frank gave a marginal nod or shake of his head every so often in response to her words, incoherently mumbling whenever he appeared particularly affected by what she had to say.

Harry had learnt during his frequent visits to this ward that Frank was still reasonably responsive to others considering his condition, if not very intelligible or coherent. On the other hand the poor man was practically paralysed, unable to move from his bed. In almost a reverse case, his wife Alice could move around freely but never made a sound, only rarely showing any reaction to outside stimulus at all.

(High, repeated exposure to the Cruciatus curse had varying effects it appeared… Harry promptly pushed that thought to the back of his mind with a shudder. He had better things to be curious about)

However, both Frank and Alice seemed to respond to Neville’s presence much more readily than anyone else, moving more animatedly and acting with more purpose whenever he drew close than Harry had ever seen them before. Even Augusta hadn’t garnered quite as much of a response as Neville did for all her conversation, though she kept pressing on none the less.

At least, until-

“…and Neville will be taking your wand to school with him of course, as a legacy-,” Augusta continued on from her tale of the Hogwarts letter finally arriving and one ‘Great Uncle Algie’s’ ecstatic reaction.

“No,” Frank suddenly interrupted.

It felt like the whole ward went silent.

Both Harry and Neville paused mid-sentence in their discussion about the Longbottom greenhouses to look at him in astonishment, the ward healer at the other end of the room dropped the clipboard she was holding, and the more lucid of the patients around them all swivelled in the direction of Frank’s bed.

Augusta in particular, looked speechless, her mouth hanging partly open and her eyes bulging. She looked like she was torn between a mother’s indignation at being refused by her child, and bursting into joyful tears.

“Not good,” Frank continued mumbling, his words gradually slurring again. “Mine… noohhhis…woulnnn wrrkgg…,”

Taken aback again, perhaps this time by the meaning of the words Frank was attempting to get out, Augusta blinked once in shock.

“Well Frank-,” Augusta warbled weakly, trying her best to sound composed. “If you say so… Neville, I think we’d better let the healers have some time with your father,”

Stunned and wide eyed, Neville absently nodded in agreement, detangling himself from Alice with a practiced ease that Harry envied. Within moments, as the ward healer came rushing over to check on Frank, Neville and his grandmother were both ready to go.

“I’ll see you later dad, mum,” Neville said softly to each of them as Augusta exchanged whispered words with the healer. “…Harry, will I see you at school this year?”

“…I think so,” Harry replied after a startled second at being addressed. “I’ll see you then?”

Neville gave him another of his nervous smiles, brimming with genuine happiness none the less.

“I’ll see you then Harry,” he replied, before his grandmother hurried him away.

It had been perhaps a single hour at most of inconsequential words, but as Neville’s form vanished through the doors of the Janus Thickey ward and the healer ushered Harry out so she could scan Frank for any changes, he wondered if perhaps he’d just made his very first friend outside of Azkaban that day.

(Later, Harry would learn that those had been Frank’s first truly discernible words in nearly ten years)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all of your comments and kudos!  
> From here on most chapters will be from Harry's point of view... with a few notable exceptions.  
> For those who guessed the identities of those reacting to the media articles in the last chapter, you were all correct (With Snape being the first, then Lupin, then McGonagall/Dumbledore, then Pettigrew and finally Quirrell/Voldemort). Some of these characters won't make an appearance in the main plot line for a while, so I wanted to give a few snapshots of their initial reactions to the news while its still fresh.  
> I'm glad the story is being enjoyed thus far!
> 
> Next time: Harry vs Diagon Alley, Rounds 1 and 2... or the obligatory shopping trip(s), and the inevitable problems discovered along the way


	5. Diagon Alley- Rounds One and Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry goes on his first ever trip to Diagon Alley.  
> ...  
> ...er, and then he goes on his second ever trip to Diagon Alley!
> 
> (He gets the feeling that this may take a while)

If the subdued colours and sparse visiting crowds of St Mungo’s had been a trial to get used to, the sheer bustling, restless, overwhelming MAGIC of Diagon Alley was an utter nightmare.

There were crowds of dozens upon dozens of witches and wizards meandering down the cobbled street, all talking in painfully loud voices. There were busy shop displays lining all angles of the Alley that were filled with produce that shone, sparkled, squeaked, smelled foul and/or let out clouds of magical energy so dense that Harry could practically SEE them. There was bright light streaming down from the sunny sky above that made his eyes water and threatened to send him into a sneezing fit. Magic of all sorts was laid so thickly on the air that it was hard for him to breathe.

Noise buzzed indistinguishably loudly in Harry’s ears. His eyes felt alternately like they might fall out of his head or melt into sightless goo with every second that passed.

Standing frozen in the archway leading into the primary magical shopping district of London, Harry was currently experiencing what felt like having all of his sensory input channels run over by a metaphorical angry hippogriff but with the additional sensation of a hammer striking him repeatedly in between the eyes.

It was purely, and simply, TOO MUCH.

…

He lasted about ten more seconds before he keeled over and crumpled into the understandably alarmed Professor McGonagall at his side.

\-------

That day, the 31st of July, was both Harry’s eleventh birthday and the one week anniversary of his liberation from Azkaban.

In preparation for this day he had written up two letters to send back to his old cellmates, one addressed to them as a whole and one just for Sirius (no matter how Aunt Bella might protest, Uncle Padfoot was still his favourite), explaining how he was doing and what was happening in the outside world.

After all, he’d been told that a representative of Hogwarts School would be coming to escort him to get his school supplies on his birthday, and Harry was sure they’d pass by at least ONE public owl office when out and about.

(Considering the mess of ‘fan mail’ for him that was regularly being wrung through St Mungo’s strict postal wards, Harry didn’t feel too confident about using the hospital owls to send the first of his monthly allowed letters to Azkaban)

Harry had also re-packed his bag with everything he took from Azkaban (just in case), regretfully combed out the foil laced braid Alice had given him in favour of his usual low ponytail, and read over the crumpled acceptance letter Headmaster Dumbledore had given him for the umpteenth time.

That morning, he’d thought he’d known what to expect.

He’d expected the new muggle style clothes he’d been gifted by the healers (a pair of black trousers, a grey shirt, black shoes and a rust red muggle hoodie that was almost as comfy as his pyjamas) that he’d been encouraged to wear for the outing.

He’d expected the arrival of the strict deputy headmistress at eight-thirty on the dot, stern and straight to business despite her clear urge to be something more- which Harry had been grateful for, he doubted he could get through an entire shopping trip while constantly being assaulted by looks of pity and concern by his escort.

He’d expected the dizzying sensation of floo travel to the Leaky Cauldron from the hospital’s public fireplace, and had even anticipated almost landing flat on his face in front of the barkeep… although Professor McGonagall had managed to steady him and briskly walk him out the back before he could be noticed by the bar patrons and subsequently mobbed.

He’d been expecting all of that to some degree, and as such was able to handle it.

What he hadn’t expected was the sheer… MAGIC Diagon Alley possessed.

And therefore, waking up in one of the Leaky Cauldron’s bedrooms with a positively frantic looking Professor hovering over him was something he hadn’t quite expected either.

“Mr Potter!” McGonagall exclaimed with relief as she saw his eyes open. “Are you alright?”

Wincing a little at the volume of her voice, Harry gently pushed himself up on his arms (he became aware he was lying on the room’s single bed) and swung his legs over the side.

“I think so,” Harry rasped out, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes a little. “It was just a little… much. I wasn’t prepared,”

“That seems like a bit of an understatement,” McGonagall muttered to herself.

“It’s fine, really,” Harry reassured her with as best a smile he could muster. “I’m- well, I guess I’m just not used to having all of this magic around quite yet,”

A genuinely crestfallen expression crossed the stern professor’s face at these words, and Harry wondered what he’d said wrong now.

\-------

Despite Harry’s repeated protests that he was fine, they did not enter the Alley again that day.

Instead (after transfiguring her tartan robes into a modest muggle dress), Professor McGonagall had taken Harry out the other door of the Leaky Cauldron into the muggle world to take the long way back to St Mungo’s… and to do some non-magical, yet still very much needed, shopping on Harry’s behalf along the way.

Oddly enough, despite displaying only marginally lower levels of noise and light, muggle London was much easier for Harry to handle than Diagon Alley had been. After some thought, he realised this was likely because he didn’t have to mentally process the constantly fluctuating mass of ambient magical energy that was usually present in wizard-and-witch-dense areas. Said mass was understandably absent in this non-magical part of the city.

And while this new environment still gave him an increasing headache and queasiness over time, what with all of those muggles rushing about and the constant stream of motor vehicles rumbling through the streets, at least it was subdued enough compared to Diagon that he hadn’t yet frozen up, ceased breathing and passed out again.

(Though he did tug up his hood and hide his face in Professor McGonagall’s side once or twice when things became a bit too much. She didn’t seem to mind)

Professor McGonagall was a half-blood, raised in the muggle world, and as such was invaluable when pointing out which mysterious gadget did what as they walked down the streets. Cars on the road, aeroplanes distantly in the sky, televisions in shop windows, headphones in teenagers’ ears… and that one terrifyingly noisy appliance being used to sweep the street that McGonagall had identified to him as a ‘leaf blower’.

Harry found himself glad he had such a knowledgeable guide for his first foray into the muggle world. After all, he was pretty sure that Uncle Padfoot would be near-useless when confronted with a public telephone, a traffic light or any other modern muggle appliance (with perhaps the exception of motorcycles)- not that any of the other pureblood Death Eaters he knew would have been any better.

The professor had first taken him to a muggle clothing store and helped him pick out three new sets of comfy shirts, trousers and sweaters in various styles (for day wear, she’d explained, also recommending that he acquire some casual wizarding style clothes when he got the chance), a pair of lace-up trainers and some pyjamas that weren’t hospital property (they were cherry leaf green, and even softer than his previous ones).

She had simply waved off Harry’s concerns about paying her back, muttering something he hadn’t quite caught about a very favourable exchange rate from galleons to muggle pounds while she collected their purchases at the register. Seeing as they hadn’t even made it to Gringotts before Harry’s collapse he didn’t exactly have the required coin on hand to pay for himself, so he reluctantly acquiesced to McGonagall’s whims… though he privately promised himself he would NEVER slack off in her class (whichever one it ended up being) in exchange.

After buying clothing, Professor McGonagall had then steered them through the frankly bewildering array of stationery in a muggle news agency to get him a decent set of notebooks and pencils (apparently the wizarding world severely overcharged for muggle-style writing materials) and a homework diary (according to her, many magical ones had a habit of giving irritating advice whenever opened).

They purchased some basic toiletries and a bag to hold them at a muggle pharmacy (which sparked an uncomfortable conversation when it was revealed Harry had never used a toothbrush before- thankfully his recently emerged adult teeth weren’t in too bad a state) and suffered through an awkward spiel from a far too enthusiastic saleswoman in order to buy a few sets of proper underclothes and socks.

And finally, as a special treat for his birthday, the professor actually let him loose in a muggle bookstore (with a budget) for an hour, upon which Harry had returned with the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy, an illustrated copy of the Hobbit and two different anthologies of Lovecraft’s works, selected out of what had admittedly been a much larger pile of books half an hour before.

(‘Ravenclaw’ she’d sighed with a weary smile. Harry decided to take it as a compliment, and shyly declined when she asked if he wanted anything else. The knowing look in her eyes made him blush)

Professor McGonagall had managed to keep up her strict professional tone for most of the journey, much to Harry’s appreciation, but she was still gentle and kind to him in a way that spoke of some kind of relationship with him beyond teacher-student… even beyond the typical almost-worship of the boy-who-lived.

Uncle Padfoot had occasionally mentioned a stern and ‘fun-killing’ transfiguration professor in his stories that had been close to both his mother and father, even after their graduation…

Whether it had been McGonagall Sirius had been referring to in those tales or not, by the time they’d taken a muggle bus back to the hospital Harry had to admit the even tempered witch was starting to grow on him.

(Especially when she’d offered to take his two letters and post them for him when she left, rather than forcing him to wait until another outing could be attempted)

The night of Harry’s eleventh birthday was spent nursing his gradually fading headache from the outing, reading muggle fantasy novels (much to the healers’ dismay, whom would have preferred him to actually sleep) and pointedly ignoring the piles of owl-delivered gifts that had made it through St Mungo’s security checks.

He’d deal with all of that tomorrow.

…or perhaps the next day

\-------

The next time Harry attempted a trip to Diagon Alley was five days later.

By this point the healers had finally managed to convince him to go through the frankly intimidating stack of gifts from his numerous well-wishers-

(-some of it was actually useful, but the bulk of it was either going straight to his Gringotts vaults for evaluation when he was older or going to be donated to charity, never to be seen again-)

-he’d forced himself to write out numerous thank-you notes of varying levels of sincerity alongside heartfelt requests not to send anything else-

(-Harry wasn’t used to this level of material ownership, and to be honest it kind of scared him how many strangers had sent him stuff. Half of his school list for Hogwarts had already been taken care of for crying out loud-)

-and he’d received replies to his letters from Azkaban, which he felt were probably the best birthday gifts of the lot right behind the muggle books Professor McGonagall had bought him.

(It hadn’t been very long since he’d left, so the letters were fairly short and largely filled with various birthday wishes. A note in Rabastan’s handwriting had mentioned the clutch of eggs ‘ _green-grey-stoneslitherer_ ’ laid had finally hatched, and that she seemed disappointed Harry wasn’t there to coo over her babies. Sirius had made mention of the very same, though with slightly more colourful language in relation to the sudden invasion of tiny venomous reptiles in the tower which, without a parselmouth on hand, were difficult to coax to leave)

It was a different professor that arrived to take him the second time, a wizard even shorter than he was by the name of Filius Flitwick who was much more jovial than Professor McGonagall had been and unfortunately much more susceptible to Harry’s perceived fame.

None the less, the little man was professional and polite despite his excitement at escorting THE Harry Potter to get his school supplies, and Harry forced down whatever irritation he felt so he wouldn’t offend him. He seemed like a nice person behind the veneer of hero-worship after all… and would eventually be one of his school teachers to boot.

He packed his bag again (this time with a number of items pre-crossed out on his supplies list), dressed in the same clothes he’d worn on his first trip (he hadn’t worn any of the other outfits McGonagall had gotten for him yet, as Harry was truly partial to the comfy feel of his new pyjamas over actual clothes), and once again headed down to the hospital floo.

But THIS time, they didn’t floo to the dark and relatively subdued atmosphere of the Leaky Cauldron to take the archway into Diagon Alley.

No, instead Professor Flitwick had managed to secure them access to a direct floo into Gringotts bank for the day by virtue of his own goblin descent (it’d been a little surprising how blithely the professor had admitted to his mixed heritage), and this time on the other end of the fire Harry found himself in a comfy looking office with marble walls and elegant carpeting.

There was a goblin sitting behind a desk whom eyed him suspiciously as he nearly tumbled to the floor again (floo travel was not something that agreed with him), but sobered upon Flitwick’s arrival directly behind him.

Quickly getting to his feet, Harry gave a respectful bow in the goblin’s direction, doing his best to recall everything Edward had told him about the powerful race.

_-‘Never trust a goblin,’ Edward Selwyn had once said to him. ‘Question every little thing they ask you to do, every ‘service’ they provide, every unknown ‘fee’ they put on your statements. But at the same time, make sure to show them the respect they are due. Goblins are naturally suspicious creatures so they’ll tolerate suspicion in turn, even praise it, but they will NOT respond well to condescension or disrespect,’_

_He’d sighed irritably at that point, clearly recalling some goblin-related situation that had made that statement necessary in his ongoing lesson on finance and business._

_‘A lot of mudbl- pardon, muggleborns make the mistake of snubbing or pitying them, thus earning their ire,’ Edward lectured. ‘But half-bloods and purebloods are often just as bad, if not worse. In their pride, many forget that goblins have authority over all of the wizarding world’s currency and at least half of our official inheritance and guardianship matters. If you want to have proper control of your own finances, it is necessary to have a good relationship with the goblins… otherwise you may find yourself waylaid by so much vindictive paperwork it could take months for you to organise even a single withdrawal from your vaults,’-_

Flitwick had jovially greeted the goblin with a similar bow (his name was apparently Ragnok, Harry made sure to file that titbit away for later), and after a brief discussion about new security measures concerning the recent break in (perhaps he ought to find some more recent copies of the Daily Prophet… Harry hadn’t heard about anyone EVER breaking into Gringotts successfully), they were curtly escorted out down a dark hallway to the ‘vault access area’.

And by ‘vault access area’, Ragnok had apparently meant mine cart death ride.

Unsure about whether or not screaming (either in joy or fright) would be considered rude, Harry did his best to simply hold on to the edge of the cart and attempt to copy the statured composure of the goblin and part goblin beside him as the cart went whizzing through the deep tunnels beneath the bank.

By the time they actually reached a vault numbered 687, Harry was starting to feel somewhat lightheaded… though he was unsure if it was from exhilaration or downright terror.

(While the lightning fast cart ride had certainly had gotten his blood pumping, he was unsure if he ever wanted to go through such an experience again)

“Now Harry, this is your trust vault,” Flitwick happily explained as they climbed out of the cart behind Ragnok. “Your parents left you a portion of their fortunes for you to use exclusively for your schooling. The fees for Hogwarts itself were paid when you were born, so you needn’t worry about that, but be aware that this is all you’ll have for personal spending until you can claim the rest of your family inheritance at seventeen,”

“Yes professor,” Harry agreed with a nod, watching as Ragnok took a tiny golden key from the small wizard and fitted it into a near invisible lock against the wall.

As the doors to the vault swung open with a rush of green smoke, Harry found himself wondering if Flitwick’s word of financial caution was really necessary as he was faced with a truly stupendous amount of galleons, sickles and knuts, alongside a neat stack of the questionably useful gifts he’d asked to be sent to his vault a few days before.

“Excuse me Ragnok,” Harry asked faintly (but politely) to the goblin now standing off to the side of the doors. “Would it be possible for me to get a statement of the contents of my trust vault?”

At first appearing surprised at being addressed, Ragnok raised an eyebrow before reciting:

“Vault 687 contains, in various denominations of coins, approximately 4300 galleons (alongside a number of other items recently deposited) with a set transfer on the 1st of August each year of an additional 299 galleons, 16 sickles, 28 knuts per year from the primary Potter vaults,” Ragnok succinctly claimed. “I can organise to duplicate and send you the quarter-yearly written statements on those vaults that are already going to your magical guardian, Mr Potter,”

“I would appreciate that, thank you,” Harry replied with a strained smile, quickly going over some mental maths concerning those frankly huge numbers. Though it might seem like a lot (especially considering the main family vaults probably contained much, MUCH more) he wasn’t about to go spending it willy-nilly…

_-‘Most pureblood wizarding families are either obscenely rich with thousands upon thousands of galleons saved, or close to destitute with barely a spare sickle to spend,’ Edward had once calmly stated. ‘The longer and more ancient their family line, the more likely this is, with rarely any middle ground. Can you tell me why that might be?’_

_Eight year old Harry had merely blinked in confusion, his ratty feather quill halting on the page of hand-written multiplication problems the former Lord Selwyn had given him to solve._

_Furrowing his brow, Harry had thought and thought, coming up with few explanations besides perhaps having more mouths to feed or maybe the family head having ticked off the goblins particularly badly. Eventually, Edward had shown mercy to eight year old Harry’s confused little brain and explained the problem._

_‘Imagine it this way. Think of two wizards, each with one heir and no other beneficiaries,’ Edward had patiently explained. ‘Both have say… ten galleons each to their name when they die. The first heir sees that money and thinks, ‘I can do whatever I like with this’, and thus makes no effort to budget or save more thinking it will last him his whole life... while the other heir looks at that money, spends some of it carefully, and then works hard or cleverly enough that he’s saved up say… twenty galleons by the time he dies,’_

_‘Now, each of these two heirs will eventually have their own heirs,’ Edward had concluded his explanation. ‘But after one generation, the first of the two will start out with near nothing, while the other has double the monetary advantage that his parent did. The first heir may have even frivolously spent ALL of his gold before he died, leaving his family destitute for possibly generations onwards while they try, and often fail, to rebuild their lost fortune,’_

_‘Remember Harry, in the real world this can happen even with millions of galleons saved in a family vault,’ Edward had cautioned. ‘I’ve seen it happen before, even with otherwise intelligent heirs that either take their wealth for granted or have never been taught proper money management. The Gaunt’s, the Weasley’s… All it can take is one or two unwise heads of a family to lose their entire fortune. And that is why you should never, ever assume that what you have inherited will be enough to last forever,’-_

Edward Selwyn had taught Harry a lot about mathematics, business and finance, and while his own family fortune might be severely shrunk due to the immense fines the ministry had taken upon his incarceration (he’d even used said incarceration as an example of an unforeseen monetary disaster that would warrant saving for), he certainly had a good eye for money and its various uses.

So keeping his advice in mind, Harry set himself a strict budget for the year. He took a relatively modest amount of galleons from the immense stack (though the 100G would still probably last him all through next year too if he didn’t buy anything too outrageous. He had a whole lot of his supplies taken care of through his birthday gifts after all), and an assortment of sickles and knuts for pocket change.

(He paid six sickles to Ragnok for a small brown belt pouch to keep his coins in. Gringotts bags held far more and weighed much less than what their size might suggest, and had basic wards against pickpockets. Even without Edward’s regular comments on their value and Flitwick’s own suggestion of the same Harry would have probably purchased one)

Professor Flitwick had seemed quite pleased by Harry’s refusal to be overwhelmed by his newfound wealth, handing over the little golden key to the eleven year old at the conclusion of their business at the vault without any complaints and only one more warning to ‘use it wisely’.

The speedy mine cart ride back up to the surface was just as wonderful/terrifying as the ride down had been (no matter they were going uphill this time), and Ragnok bid Harry and Flitwick a gruff (but polite, Harry was pleased to note) farewell at the doors into the marble entrance hall of the bank.

Harry internally celebrated having not horribly offended any goblins on his first ever visit to Gringotts as they both passed by the tellers to the front doors, weaving through several strictly organised and heavily guarded lines of waiting witches and wizards as they went. There were a large number of spear wielding goblins present alongside the tellers, which Harry assumed had something to do with the recent break-in, but Flitwick got them past any potential confrontations with ease.

It was when they were leaving the bank when the problems began.

For all that he’d approached from a different entrance this time, Diagon Alley was still so… MAGIC that Harry found himself screwing up his poor abused eyes as soon as the wave of sensory overload threatened to hit on the steps of Gringotts.

It had taken removing his glasses, pulling his hood up as far as it would go, plugging an ear with one hand and letting Professor Flitwick guide him through the crowds with the other in order to get Harry safely to the first stop for his school supplies, a clothing shop called Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasions.

Thankfully nobody around them had noticed the boy-who-lived in the busy crowds of Diagon Alley, otherwise Harry was pretty sure he wouldn’t have made it in one piece. It seemed that as soon as he covered up his scarred arms, legs and (most notably) forehead, most wizards and witches seemed incapable of recognising him at a glance… a fact Harry made an effort to remember for later use even as he tried not to throw up on the floor of the robe shop.

“Oh dear, Minerva really wasn’t joking about your sensitivity,” Professor Flitwick murmured sympathetically as Harry slumped wearily against the wall inside Madam Malkin’s door, thankful that at least the auditory stimulus from outside had been cut in half once it had shut.

“I’m just not used to it all yet,” Harry replied with an apologetic smile to the small professor. “I’m getting better though, I swear. Last time I actually passed out,”

Apparently this was the wrong thing to say, as Flitwick’s bushy eyebrows shot up into his hairline in alarm, and the small man began muttering worriedly to himself.

Harry suddenly had a bad feeling he wasn’t going to get his school shopping done today either.

\-------

The owner of the shop, Madam Malkin, was squat, smiling witch dressed in mauve whom had delightedly taken down the list of clothing Harry had requested (which by McGonagall’s earlier suggestion consisted not only of his school required clothing, but two sets of informal day robes, several matching wizarding style tunics and trousers for underneath, a spare cloak and two different kinds of shoes) and then stood him rigidly upon a stool at the back of the shop for what felt like several hours in order to take his measurements and ‘outfit him properly’.

Unlike muggle clothes, which could be bought straight off the rack without much adjustment, wizarding clothes (and robes especially) required a degree of tailoring in order to properly fit their owners and as such made purchasing them a fairly lengthy experience.

And while Harry already knew some needlework himself, he also knew that he wasn’t anywhere near a level where he could adjust his own robes from scratch, leaving him just as doomed as the next wizard to a long series of tape measures, pins and idle chatter with the tailor and/or seamstress. Which reminded him, he should probably pick up some sewing needles and thread before he went to Hogwarts. At least then he’d be able to handle any patching or letting the seams out himself…

_-‘You don’t need to go through a whole tailoring apprenticeship just to repair one little rip,’ Raleigh Gibbon had often preached, usually with some damaged article of clothing or bedding in his hands at the time with his set of homemade rat-bone needles beside him. The Gibbon family was one of the poorer pureblood lines that had followed the Dark Lord, and as such Raleigh was quite skilled with household chores and repairs._

_He’d been the one whom had torn apart the oversized uniform the dementors’ gave Harry and sewn it back into a reasonably fitting set of clothes time and time again over the years as he’d grown. The practical man had also helped to teach Harry a number of mundane skills like modest darning and simple cooking (as best as he could with what little supplies they had available of course) that the other Death Eaters had scoffed at._

_‘Not everyone can afford house elves,’ he’d shrugged every time after he got such a comment, and later the perpetrator would often find themselves beset by… strange occurrences, like their cell doors making ear-bleeding sounds when opened or repeatedly finding mice in their shoes. Coincidentally, Raleigh was one of the first Death Eaters that had earned Sirius’s begrudging approval._

_(Harry still remembered the time Raleigh had stitched Uncle Padfoot’s sleeves shut while he was sleeping, leading to a rather terrifying spike in the ongoing tower prank war once his godfather exacted what he called ‘a Marauder’s revenge’. Both Raleigh and Rabastan steered clear of ‘challenging’ him after that, instead roping an extremely reluctant Augustus into their antics a year later)-_

Professor Flitwick had run off five minutes into the increasingly boring exercise of clothes fitting with a handful of politely borrowed galleons and the excuse of going to pick up his remaining potions equipment, quills, parchment, ink and a small sewing kit (this last item at Harry’s personal request) for which Harry was begrudgingly grateful.

He didn’t exactly NEED to be there to get those miscellaneous supplies (like for his clothing and eventually his wand) nor did he WANT to be really (unlike when he would finally get his chance to enter a magical bookstore), but disappointingly the little professor’s behaviour further seemed to cement that once he was done with his fitting, he’d be relegated back to St Mungo’s until another Hogwarts representative could be spared to escort him again.

Stupid bloody sensory sensitivity.

Roughly twenty minutes into being measured, being repetitively asked his preferred colours and styles, and being accidentally poked with pins if he moved even the slightest bit, the door to the shop opened once again.

He heard Madam Malkin’s apprentice out the front greeting someone, a quick and near inaudible exchange of words, and then the door being exited once more.

A few moments later a boy his age was being ushered into the back and stood up upon the stool beside him, presumably left behind by one of his parents for his fitting.

He had dark brown hair, was much taller than Harry, and had a fixed, critical look in his eyes. His robes were exquisitely tailored, and his face bore the familiar sharp features Harry had seen upon many of his former cellmates…

This, combined with the rigid posture and calculated stride the boy employed (a rigidity that Aunt Bella had indeed spent many years trying, without much success, to get Harry to employ himself), practically screamed that this new customer was a pureblood, and likely from a highly… ‘traditional’ family.

Harry suppressed a nervous gulp, steeling himself for the inevitable interaction. He already knew this would be nothing like chatting with Neville but… but he had survived nine years in close contact with convicted adult Death Eaters, surely he could survive one conversation with a questionably aligned boy his own age!

“Hello,” Harry greeted hesitantly as the boy had a black Hogwarts robe slipped over his head by Malkin’s apprentice. “My name is Harry, what’s your name?”

The boy seemed to stiffen a little, his deep eyes covertly sliding over his neighbour without moving his head to look at him properly.

“Theodore,” the boy, Theodore, replied, before resolutely turning his gaze back to the front.

Harry waited with bated breath for Theodore to say something else, countless points of formal etiquette instruction from Aunt Bella reeling around his mind.

…

And thus the next ten minutes went spent in awkward silence, broken only by the flick of tape measures, the rustle of cloth and the occasional comment from the seamstresses. Harry suppressed his urge to fidget, somewhat jealous of the way Theodore seemed to be able to petrify himself on command.

(He wasn’t sure if he felt relieved or wary of the fact the boy hadn’t yet said another word)

In the end, it seemed that Theodore was only here for his Hogwarts robes rather than an entire wardrobe as Harry was, because all too soon he had his black robes slid off for further tailoring and was elegantly stepping down off his stool. But before he exited the fitting area, he paused.

“I will see you at school,” Theodore said curtly, with a polite and sharp nod to Harry, before turning on his heel and speed walking out of sight to the front of the shop.

Harry blinked once in confusion.

He blinked again, actively having to stop himself from gaping as the doorbell tinkled once again, heralding Theodore’s exit from the store. That had been… well, strange.

Neither of them had said more than ten words apiece, yet there had been an amiable courtesy in Theodore’s parting words that Harry wasn’t sure what he had done to have earned. Perhaps it was merely because he’d been recognised as the boy-who-lived…? But Theodore hadn’t mentioned anything about it… Then again Theodore hadn’t said much of anything at all, and neither had Harry for that matter.

When Flitwick returned fifteen minutes later with a generous handful of spare change and a bobbing line of floating shopping bags in tow, Harry was still entirely bewildered over his second ever encounter with one of his future schoolmates. In the end, all he could really surmise was that Theodore (of an as yet unknown last name) either had a very different idea of proper etiquette than what Harry did… or was the most painfully shy person he’d ever met.

(Weirdly enough though, Harry caught himself wondering if he and Neville would get along)

\-------

After his fitting was done and the owl address for the robe delivery was confirmed, as expected Harry was escorted right back to the Leaky Cauldron floo by Professor Flitwick and promptly deposited back into his hospital room.

The little professor wasn’t overly apologetic about this further delay in his supplies shopping, citing both Harry’s convalescing state and his sensory sensitivity-

(-the professor had made mention of his second reaction in Diagon to Harry’s healers, much to the boy’s frustration. Now there’d likely be yet ANOTHER round of poking and prodding for him to go through during his daily check-ups-)

-but Flitwick did attempt make up for it by going through all of Harry’s new equipment, both the items which he had purchased on his behalf and the gifts he’d set aside to take to school, explaining to him in detail how each piece worked for each class.

After much deliberation (and what ended up being a fascinating conversation on how the sturdy collapsible telescope he’d been sent by one R.L. functioned) Harry decided that Professor Flitwick was alright, despite the traces of hero-worship that remained about his person and the second postponement to his foray into Diagon Alley he’d enforced.

All in all it had been a decent day, if a little frustrating.

…

Or at least, Harry found himself infinitely preferring it to his next few ill-fated trips to the Alley in the weeks afterwards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Scores are currently Diagon Alley: 2 Harry Potter: 0
> 
> Many thanks to those who left comments and kudos!  
> Rest assured that Neville will be appearing quite a bit in this story once Harry gets to Hogwarts, though I'm afraid it will be a bit longer before we see Sirius free again (his trial date is still quite a few months off after all, in November as the Ministry told the papers).  
> Now Harry vs Diagon Alley was originally meant to be just one chapter, but as you can see the plot kind of grew wings and flew off in a number of different directions that I just couldn't help but expand on a bit more. As such, I will release the other half of Harry's struggles with school shopping at some point in the next week instead of waiting my usual two- so enjoy the extra chapter when it arrives!
> 
> Next time: Harry vs Diagon Alley- Rounds Three and Four... or what do you mean being able to sense magic use itself is unusual?


	6. Diagon Alley- Rounds Three and Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry braves Diagon Alley twice more in an effort to complete his school shopping, and meets a few more of his professors-to-be along the way.
> 
> Some of them are easier for him to handle than others.

The next time Harry went into Diagon Alley was three days after his trip with Professor Flitwick.

By this stage, all that Harry really had left to buy (for his school list at any rate), was his wand, about half of the books on the list that he hadn’t already been gifted copies of, MAYBE a pet and of course, a good trunk or suitcase to put his increasing pile of worldly belongings inside of.

(Though he was loathe to admit it, Harry knew that there wasn’t nearly enough room for everything he needed in the small grey bag he’d taken all the way from Azkaban)

This time, his escort was one Professor Sprout, a witch that was probably even more cheerful than Flitwick had been but with much the same professional demeanour of McGonagall. She’d promptly side-along apparated him to the Alley from the hospital exit this time (a sensation, to Harry’s horror, that he found was even more disorienting than that of the floo), directly in front of the next shop he needed for his supplies, keeping the sheer MAGIC of Diagon from bothering him too much.

…although it wasn’t JUST the magic alone, Harry now had to admit. After having the same reaction on two different trips to Diagon Alley, the concerned healers at St Mungo’s had finally done some in depth (and uncomfortable) tests on his apparent sensory sensitivities over the past few days.

It seemed that so long within the monotonous walls of Azkaban (and without the prior worldly experience an older wizard would have to act as a counterbalance) had made Harry’s eyes and ears highly attuned to colour, light, noise… and to the healer’s great surprise, excess magic use. Apparently, being able to ‘feel’ magic as he did wasn’t exactly normal for wizards. Huh.

And now he was out in the real world, where colour, light etcetera was much more common… well, receiving so much excess sensory input compared to what his body was used to was understandably difficult for Harry. It usually resulted in increasingly strong headaches, bouts of queasiness and in his worst reactions (as he’d learnt on his first trip to Diagon) a tendency to freeze, cease breathing while trying to process the overload of information and subsequently pass out.

After some (even less comfortable) medical experimentation it was revealed that being exposed to several different kinds of stimuli in combination tended to trigger the worst of these symptoms, explaining why the relatively muted atmosphere of St Mungo’s or the non-magical bustle of muggle London hadn’t affected him as badly as the bright, loud and obviously enchanted Diagon Alley did.

The healers had assured him the sensory stimulation would get easier for him to handle over time as his body and mind adjusted (which was true, now that a few weeks had passed Harry hardly ever experienced headaches while in St Mungo’s anymore) but they knew no quick fix for such an unusual problem, even with magic. In fact, considering Harry’s unusual ability to ‘feel’ magic, a solution based on it could potentially make his problem even worse.

Which meant that, for now at least, there was no cure for the painful, dizzying buzzing in his ears that resulted from the split second he’d been exposed to Diagon’s bustle in between Professor Sprout’s apparition and entering the shops… other than simply waiting it out.

Thankfully, the professor gave him a moment to recover by the door before continuing on, patiently waiting while Harry got his breath back and stubbornly convinced his brain that the world was NOT spinning around them.

(Though he had a feeling that the apparition itself may have been to blame for that particular side effect)

Professor Sprout was a fairly pleasant witch, Harry quickly learnt. She had a sensible and light hearted demeanour that reminded Harry of Neville a little, with a matching strong emphasis on practicality and learning as you go… though Sprout had a much more outspoken attitude about, as she put it, ‘sitting around reading all day rather than getting some real experience in the field’.

…

…and if they had gone anywhere OTHER than Flourish and Blotts that day for Harry’s long awaited school books, perhaps he would have been completely okay with this down to earth attitude. As it stood, by the fourth time Harry had been ‘kindly’ denied a chance to purchase anything other than EXACTLY what was written on his supplies list, he honestly wanted to scream in frustration.

The bookstore was incredible, with rows and rows of shelves that seemingly stretched off into infinity filled with tomes on every single subject imaginable… but under the professor’s watchful eye he was kept firmly corralled to the up-front school displays, limited to gazing longingly the tempting aisle titles from a distance. Abjuration and warding studies, beasts of the world, common cookery, defensive magic, everyday charms and transfigurations… Merlin, it was like holding a delicious bowl of soup just out of the reach of a starving man!

(Seriously, he’d barely spent more than eighteen galleons on his clothes, miscellaneous supplies and books combined so far, it wasn’t like his budget was an issue! Just how much exactly was Sprout expecting his minimal further shopping to dig into his savings?!)

And so it ended up being a rather depressed looking Harry whom was blearily ushered out of Diagon Alley’s overwhelming MAGIC-

(-even if the healers had found otherwise, that adjective still came to mind whenever Harry’s head began to pound at the sight of the shopping district-)

-and into the next shop for his school supplies. Fitted out like a display room, this store (that he’d completely missed the name of in his book-deprived misery) was piled high with stacks of old fashioned steamer trunks, suitcases made with odd looking leathers and hides, satchels with placards proudly stating the myriad of charms woven into their fabrics and a variety of other items clearly intended for various forms of storage.

“I think this had better be the last stop for the day Mr Potter,” Professor Sprout said warmly, clearly mistaking Harry’s downcast literature-denied expression as another symptom of incoming sensory overload. “We’ll just get you set up with a good sturdy trunk and get you back to your room at St Mungo’s. I’m sure Professor Dumbledore can find a time to take you for your wand in a few more days,”

Not really feeling the urge to try and argue with the matronly, if stubborn, witch, Harry simply nodded wearily in reply, unintentionally furthering her idea that he was somehow exhausted after barely an hour of shopping (half of which had been spent looking longingly at thick tomes that he hadn’t been allowed to purchase).

A perky shop assistant came over promptly to start expounding on the many virtues of their ‘Hogwarts Ready’ line of trunks, and by the five minute mark of their little spiel Harry was already starting to zone out.

So it was to his great surprise that once the assistant stepped back for a moment to let them browse, Professor Sprout had immediately walked him over to almost the other end of the trunk section, stopping in front of a display declaring:

‘ **A Personal Library wherever you go! Travel with an extra compartment just for your reading! Rune bound permanent Featherlight Charm complimentary with purchase!** ’

The deep trunk on the display kept opening and closing every few seconds, showing one compartment filled with a variety of clothes and equipment, before opening again on a compartment of a similar depth but lined with shelves that somehow held far more books than a comparably sized muggle bookshelf could realistically fit.

“I figured you might want a safe place for everything you want to read before going to stock up on books,” Professor Sprout said wryly as Harry found himself entranced by the display. “And if you can afford a high quality trunk to go with the enchantment, the longer it will last before the binding runes need servicing,”

…Okay, so maybe Professor Sprout wasn’t so bad after all.

\-------

After leaving the luggage shop with a sturdy brown two compartment trunk (one of which was, of course, the expanded bookshelf), a tough book bag the professor had recommended for classes and a book on magical locking and warding designed for luggage security (which had been a reluctant compromise to stop Harry from immediately returning to Flourish and Blotts, escort or no), Harry found himself roughly twenty-five galleons lighter and with a better understanding of why Professor Sprout may not have wanted to let him loose in the bookstore just yet.

While he did have plenty of money left over (over 50G, in fact), his enchanted trunk had been much more expensive than he’d anticipated; getting the best quality trunk and charm-rune binding the store had on offer had cost more than everything else he’d already bought in Diagon combined. (Though with any luck this meant that he wouldn’t have to spend anything else on repairing or, Merlin forbid, replacing said trunk for upwards of a decade)

After some deliberation, Harry decided that just in case his budget was stretched again by unexpectedly expensive items, it would probably be for the best that he waited until after finished getting his school supplies before going to buy more books.

Which, he realised to his surprise as Professor Sprout warmly bid him farewell at the hospital reception, only really comprised of his wand. And maybe a pet, though that wasn’t exactly mandatory. No matter how overprotective his next escort to Diagon Alley was, Harry was pretty sure that meant it would be his last trip to the overly magical shopping area for the year.

(At last!)

After taking the now well-known path back up to his room on the fourth floor, waving to a few of the healers he knew as he passed by and avoiding the hunting crowds of fans that stalked from hallway to hallway-

(-thank Merlin that they seemed incapable of recognising him when he had all his scars covered up. Things were so much easier for him when he couldn’t be recognised on sight! At this stage, Harry had long since decided he would avoid having his photo taken and published at all costs if it meant he could keep this little sliver of anonymity-)

-Harry slipped past the drowsy auror stationed at his door and finally set down his unrealistically light feeling trunk at the end of his bed.

And, feeling a little giddy with anticipation, he opened it up. The normal compartment, for now, was empty, but with a twist of the key in the opposite direction the bookshelf was revealed, already half a shelf full with the course books he’d purchased that day.

Carefully, sorting meticulously and folding tightly to give himself the most amount of room, Harry packed away both his muggle and wizarding clothes (most of which were still in their wrappings or with tags on), his potions kit (alongside the veritable apothecary of extra ingredients he’d received as birthday gifts), all of the miscellaneous items that had been on his list (his rolls of new parchment and empty notebooks on their own shelf), the sewing kit Flitwick had purchased for him (as yet unopened, but he was planning on sewing his name into his unlabelled muggle clothes as his supplies list demanded within the next few days) and the vast majority of his thick and heavy textbooks.

(He was keeping that locking and warding book out for study tonight. The small trunk key on the chain around his neck beside his vault key could only do so much to protect his belongings, and if there were extra precautions he could take he would gladly utilise them)

And once he was done with his new belongings, then…

…then, with a sense of great reluctance, Harry gradually unpacked the contents of his little grey bag from Azkaban into the new trunk too. There wasn’t very much in comparison.

His old prison uniform (washed by the hospital house elves and thus cleaner than it’d ever been before), Edward’s too-big shoes and Barty’s old glasses (Harry couldn’t remember very much of the man his first set of glasses had come from, but Rodolphus had once said Barty would have been happy they could find a use for them), a parchment wrapped package of fire-dried cherries (and the cherry pits he’d saved from those he’d eaten, Harry just couldn’t throw them away…), his best handmade quill tipped with a fine rod of charcoal (which was honestly quite ratty compared to the store made ones he now owned) and a myriad of hand-written scrolls and notebooks… old lessons and work from Azkaban.

As he packed, Harry found himself wondering what Hogwarts might be like in comparison to what he already knew. Every single one of the wizards (and witch) in the northern tower had taught him bits and pieces of what they knew over the years, and while Harry was aware that it wasn’t all Hogwarts material, he was becoming increasingly aware that some of it WAS.

Comparing the titles of his new school books and the material he had taken from Azkaban, he spotted quite a few similarities indeed.

Donnell Jugson’s lists of magical flora and their uses in potions… Phineas Travers’ notes on modern magical history… Rodolphus Lestrange’s maps of the stars they’d huddled over on the rare nights the sky was clear… And not forgetting of course, the lengthy combined spell annals that Augustus Rookwood, Antonin Dolohov and Rabastan Lestrange had compiled for him over the years despite their lack of wands.

_-‘For the last time Rabastan, we are NOT teaching him the entrails-expelling curse!’ the highly irritated voice of one Augustus Rookwood had shouted._

_Antonin Dolohov, whom had been going through the motions of a simple mouse-to-teacup transfiguration with a nine year old Harry at the time in the cell next to where this argument was taking place, had simply rolled his eyes and went back to correcting Harry’s posture with the cherry wood twig they were using in place of a wand._

_‘C’mon ‘Gus, it’s not like we can keep the entire set of annals composed of light and neutral spells…we’re starting to run out of material!’ Rabastan Lestrange’s voice had promptly wheedled back through the thin wall._

_‘Absolutely NOT!’ Augustus had growled. ‘For one thing, Sirius would murder us!’_

_There had been a notable silence then, which Antonin had gladly filled with a description for Harry of the effect this transfiguration would have if practiced with a true wand._

_‘…so… no including dark spells that he would recognise, then?’ Rabastan had eventually suggested._

_‘Please, he’s a BLACK,’ Augustus had scoffed in reply._

_‘No dark spells period it is!’ Rabastan had cheerfully acquiesced._

_‘And it took us so long to convince your godfather that we WEREN’T going to try and corrupt you…,’ Antonin had sighed despairingly as Harry began to giggle at the overheard conversation…-_

Smiling at the memory, Harry abruptly paused as he came across a single scroll much older than the others, blank but for a neatly written alphabet across the top in the ersatz charcoal ‘ink’ all of the Azkaban scrolls utilised… and followed by a much messier copy of the alphabet right below, written by a clearly much less experienced hand.

Unbidden, Harry felt his smile softening nostalgically at the sight. Uncle Padfoot, Sirius Black (the two names seemed to interchange more and more the longer he was out of Azkaban… his godfather would probably find it funny) had certainly taken great pains to teach his five-year old self how to properly handle a quill. He was a little surprised that any of those earlier exercises had remained intact after all this time.

Once every book and scroll was stored and the old grey bag itself was secreted away at the bottom of the normal compartment, Harry sat back and examined his half-empty trunk.

…well, he had seven years left to go in which to fill it.

\-------

An entire week passed after his lacklustre outing with Professor Sprout before his next escort to Diagon Alley could spare some time.

There were only two weeks or so left before the start of term now, and honestly Harry was starting to get a little anxious at the lack of contact by the time the healers finally informed him someone else was coming. The pet and the extra books he wanted he could do without if necessary, but he couldn’t exactly attend Hogwarts without a wand.

He really hoped he could finish off his shopping this time without being overwhelmed, because who knew how long it might take for another escort to be available?

Wand first, Harry found himself repeating in his head the night before his final trip to the Alley, wand first, wand first, wand first. And then, if whichever professor arrived that time could be convinced he’s not on the verge of collapse, then the books.

(The idea of a pet had honestly been abandoned in Harry’s mind by this point)

That morning, Harry decided to dress in wizarding clothes rather than the muggle outfit he’d worn during the last three outings, choosing a neutral grey robe over a dark green tunic and black trousers. It just seemed like appropriate attire if he was going to get a wand, even if the tailored clothing wasn’t quite as comfortable as his muggle hoodie or his wonderfully soft pyjamas.

He waited patiently in his room for the professor to arrive, resisting the urge to seek some peace in the Janus Thickey Ward and absently wondering who it might be. Professor Sprout had suggested it might be Dumbledore himself this time (in which case Harry was a little nervous, the old man usually seemed to be dressed in eye-watering attire), or perhaps it was possible that one of the three that had come before might take another turn (personally, Harry was rooting for McGonagall).

…

So of course, it ended up being Severus Snape of all people who swept into his room at nine o’clock sharp that morning.

The man was older than Harry remembered from the scarce visions that had flashed across his mind during numerous lessons with Florian, hair longer and skin sallower than it had been in the past, but the ex-Death Eater was instantly recognisable none the less.

There was a moment where Harry internally panicked, wondering how on earth this person could have gotten onto the approved visitors list unless he was- no, he couldn’t be, why would Dumbledore hire someone who-?

And then their eyes met, inky black and vivid green. Harry inadvertently remembered-

_-‘And if you ever run into Severus, kick him for me, all right?’ Florian Mulciber had earnestly asked, a hint of mischief of those pale brown eyes…-_

-and the dour man in black across the room seemingly tripped over nothing, stumbling midway through his intimidating stride and barely catching himself before he could fall to the floor.

There was a long, eerie silence.

Snape recovered himself, clearly startled but trying to hide it, and looked back up at Harry with a poisonous glare.

“…Hello, my name is Harry,” Harry managed to politely say, a meek smile plastered onto his face to hide his suspicions. “I guess you’re a professor from Hogwarts, sir?”

Upon hearing Harry’s raspy voice, Snape immediately tensed and almost flinched before composing himself. Somehow, he managed to glare even harder at Harry in response, cementing the answer to Harry’s question.

Severus Snape was his escort to Diagon Alley today.

…he had a feeling this wasn’t going to end well.

\-------

The trip to Diagon Alley with Professor Sprout had been disappointing, but useful. His journey with Professor Flitwick had been fruitful, if a little frustrating. And the tour around London with Professor McGonagall had been entirely un-magical, but the most enjoyable of the three outings if he was being honest.

And now, with Sever- ahem, Professor Snape guiding him through the Leaky Cauldron (once again having travelled by floo) with an extremely sour look on his face, Harry found himself absently wondering if this fourth excursion might end with an attempted homicide.

Out of all the professors at Hogwarts Harry had met so far, Snape was the one he had the most prior knowledge about… even if he hadn’t been aware the ex-Death Eater had become a teacher until about twenty minutes ago. And it seemed that Snape was quite ‘familiar’ with Harry too, considering his less than friendly behaviour.

After all, Snape’s VERY FIRST ACTION upon seeing him had been to try and enter Harry’s surface memories via legilimency, so he had a definite suspicion the professor was at least wary of him, if not outright hostile.

Now… Harry had a suspicious feeling the clear dislike had less to do with Snape’s old ‘affiliations’ and more to do with what Uncle Padfoot called… the Marauder Days. Days in which a younger and significantly less dangerous Snape had been a steady- er, victim of both his godfather AND his biological father. Distrust and enmity was really to be expected from Snape when confronting the child of a marauder raised by yet another marauder.

But really, outright attempting to legilimise him was going a bit far. Just how had Snape expected him to react to the intrusion besides straight up ‘kicking’ him out?

_-‘There are several levels of competency in the art of occlumency,’ Florian Mulciber had once explained to him. ‘From the basest awareness of the fact that a legilimens is trying to access your memories, to the most advanced false memory shields that can convince an invader that they’re seeing the real thing while simultaneously guarding your true consciousness,’_

_‘Even the most basic mental shields can help organise and keep your…less pleasant memories and weaknesses in check…,’ Florian had uncomfortably skirted around the topic of WHY Harry was taking these lessons in the first place. ‘…but once you’ve got a good start on that, we can get into the fun stuff! Like practicing kicking anyone rude enough to try and legilimise you right out of your mind! It may not be subtle, but sometimes simply booting the aggressor out of your thoughts is much more effective than simply trying to rely on prior built up shields, especially if they’re trying to attack your mind with a memory charm or the Imperius curse at the time,’_

_‘If you’re ready?’ Florian had then asked brightly, to which seven year old Harry had nodded vigorously. ‘Then, **legilimens**...,’-_

“What do you have left to purchase?” Professor Snape asked smoothly, barely managing to hide his hostility with an unshakably even tone and dragging Harry out of his thoughts. They had reached the poky back-alley where the entrance to Diagon was concealed.

“Just my wand, and a few extra books if we have time sir,” Harry answered politely, hoping that if he could manage to be as non-troublesome as possible he might end this trip with all four limbs still attached. After all, he’d heard a lot of things about one Severus Snape in the northern tower besides Sirius’s relatively more innocent tales from his youth.

Honestly? He’d rather not test the patience of a man well known amongst the Death Eaters he knew for brewing impeccable poisons, inventing spells that left cuts that couldn’t be healed and was also an accomplished occlumens and legilimens to boot, attested to by the fact Harry had barely been able to throw off his initial mental probe.

Harry’s own occlumency shields, while decent for an eleven year old with four years of practice under his belt, were both far from perfect and often focused within rather than poised against external threats… All he could really do was avoid making eye contact again and hope that Snape didn’t feel aggravated enough to corner him and try to delve deeper during their trip. Neither of them had brought up the professor’s first attempt at trying to access Harry’s mind yet, and he didn’t feel like tempting fate by asking.

The gateway into Diagon Alley abruptly opened, and Harry barely had time to remove his glasses before the colours and lights hit, hastily tracking the tall dark figure of the professor through the crowds by his distinct stride and un-colourful clothing.

(He found himself suddenly regretting not having a hood to hide in, and absently wondered if ANY of his wizarding clothes had such a welcome addition. Dang it, he should have asked Madam Malkin specifically for hooded robes and cloaks when he had the chance)

The blurry sign for Ollivanders (to Harry’s eyes at least) came up to them quickly, and Harry entered the store after Professor Snape without any fanfare, quickly replacing his glasses once the door shut… although, that time had been much better than the last few tries he’d had at traversing the Alley Harry realised, only feeling slightly ill as he looked around.

(The healers must have been right when they said he’d get used even to Diagon’s sheer MAGIC over time. Hopefully that meant eventually even this lingering headache and queasiness would someday be absent after a stroll through the shopping district)

The shop was empty but for a simple counter, a spindly chair that neither he nor the professor moved to take and shelves and shelves packed full of long, narrow boxes.

“Good afternoon,” said a soft voice, and Harry nearly jumped as a hunched over old man with pale eyes appeared out of the rows of shelving.

“Hello,” Harry said in return after a moment, realising Professor Snape wasn’t going to speak and was instead glaring out the grubby window. “I’d like to buy a wand please,”

“Ah yes,” said the man, likely Mr Ollivander and the owner of the store. “Yes, yes, I thought I’d be seeing you soon Mr Potter, for your first wand. After all that commotion in the papers…,”

“We do not have all day to spare Mr Ollivander,” Professor Snape drawled, still gazing out the window instead of facing the wandmaker. “If you could get on with finding Mr Potter his wand…?”

Mr Ollivander seemed to notice Snape’s presence in his store for the first time.

“Ah, Severus! Severus Snape! A pleasure to see you again. Nine and half inches, acacia I recall?” Mr Ollivander said brightly, pale eyes twinkling.

Professor Snape seemed to be barely restraining himself from saying something nasty to the curious old wizard, so Harry decided to step in.

“You can recognise his wand on sight?” Harry asked, not entirely feigning the curiosity in his voice.

“Not recognise. Remember. Every wand I’ve ever sold, I remember Mr Potter,” the wandmaker replied, suddenly solemn as he immediately focused back on Harry. “Your mother’s, ten and a quarter inches, willow, quite swishy. Your father’s-,”

Harry was certain he heard Professor Snape make an unpleasant noise, but his expression was as impassive as ever when he glanced over.

“Eleven inches, pliable and made of mahogany…,” Mr Ollivander continued, getting closer and closer to Harry’s face without appearing to visibly move. “I regret to say I even sold the wand that gave you that scar…,”

This time the professor audibly ‘ahem’-ed in an irritable fashion, and Mr Ollivander’s fingers (which were millimetres away from touching said scar on Harry’s forehead) quickly retreated. Harry managed not to openly sigh in relief. The wandmaker was quickly becoming one of the creepiest people he’d ever met, and considering some of the people he’d grown up around that was saying something.

“Well, to business then. Which is your wand arm Mr Potter?” Mr Ollivander promptly asked as he drew back, all professional once more.

“My right,” Harry answered, holding out said arm as Mr Ollivander drew a tape measure from nowhere and began to take his measurements.

The old wizard began to babble/lecture about the different cores Ollivander wands used as he measured (Snape’s wand apparently had dragon heartstring at its core, and the professor abruptly turned his glare from the window to the wandmaker after he made this apparently unwanted revelation) and how the wand tends to choose the wizard rather than the other way round.

Roughly halfway through this rambling explanation Mr Ollivander left the tape measure behind to start pulling seemingly random boxes from the shelves at the back of the shop… without stopping the tape measure from measuring Harry first, leaving him somewhat trapped in position with his wand arm outstretched and an unattended tape flying around him in a bewildering pattern.

(He caught Professor Snape smirking at him from the corner of his eye, and the relatively pleased expression on the so far dour man’s face seemed almost alien. Well, the more things that made him happy and less likely to dismember Harry by the end of the shopping trip, the better right…?)

“That will do,” the wandmaker abruptly said as he came back with a large stack of boxes in his arms, and the tape measure rolled itself up and fell to the ground. “Try this one here Mr Potter, beechwood and dragon heartstring, nine inches…,”

Gingerly, Harry reached out to pluck said wand from the box on top of the pile Mr Ollivander had now deposited on the counter, but he’d barely gotten a good grip on it before the wandmaker snatched it from his hands.

“Oh no definitely not,” Mr Ollivander muttered, placing the wand back in its box and moving it onto the unoccupied chair. “How about… ah! Ebony and unicorn hair, an elegant design…,”

But again, the wand was lifted from his fingers almost as soon as Harry had taken it from its box. As was the next one (‘maple and phoenix feather, quite whippy’), and the one after that (‘eight and a quarter inches, oak and unicorn hair’) and so on so forth, until the entire pile Mr Ollivander had selected had been exhausted and the strange old man went bouncing back into the shelves to pick out some more.

Oddly enough, he seemed to be getting more and more excited the more wands Harry went through, much to the clear irritation of the dour professor standing by the door.

Harry had high hopes for a cherry wood and dragon heartstring wand midway through the second pile that Mr Ollivander brought out, but it was taken from his hands just as quickly as the others. A couple of the phoenix feather core wands seemed to vibrate slightly as Harry lifted them (the most response he’d gotten from any so far) but even they were unacceptable by the wandmakers unknown, yet exacting standards.

By the time the wandmaker retreated back into the shelves to gather a third pile of wands to test, even Harry was starting to feel a little anxious. He knew that choosing the right wand could be a lengthy process but this was getting ridiculous!

“Tricky customer, eh? Not entirely unexpected, but I know we’ll find a perfect match here somewhere… Hmm, why not try an unusual combination, holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches…,” the wandmaker mused.

Harry had already reached out to take the suggested wand midway through Mr Ollivander’s description of it, and he immediately felt a warmth in his fingers as they brushed the wood. Pausing for a moment, Harry examined the unembellished wand, feeling soft pulses of heat flooding through his hand and up his arm almost like a heartbeat.

Giving it a small wave, a silvery mist followed by bright white sparks shot from the end of the wand and he couldn’t help the relieved grin that crossed his face.

“Oh bravo, bravo!” Mr Ollivander cried in delight. “A good match indeed, but curious… very curious…,”

“Thank you, the boy will pay for the wand and we’ll be on our way,” Professor Snape sharply cut off whatever the wandmaker was going to mumble next, and Mr Ollivander snapped out of his musings immediately, taking Harry’s wand back to wrap it up in brown paper for transport.

The wand cost seven galleons (apparently phoenix feather was harder to obtain than the other two kinds of cores) and Harry gladly took the box, both he and his escort well and ready to be on the way to the bookstore… albeit for very different reasons. Professor Snape thankfully didn’t seem to be in too bad of a mood for all the time he’d waited for Harry to select his wand, but none the less he didn’t dawdle as they strode swiftly out of the shop.

The professor would barely speak for the rest of the journey, allowing Harry to browse through Flourish and Blotts for a few hours without interruption before escorting him back to the hospital in the afternoon. While Harry wouldn’t be maimed and/or murdered, the tense atmosphere between them and the unanswered questions about the attempt at legilimency would remain… on both sides.

But at that time Harry didn’t know this, and walked back out into the MAGIC of Diagon Alley feeling tense and wary despite his relief at finally having his necessary shopping done, clutching his boxed wand tightly in his arms.

(And as the door shut behind them, leaving the old wandmaker alone, the knowledge of just whose wand Harry’s now shared a core with remained secret to all but one. Curious indeed, Mr Ollivander thought, and he returned to his work)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final scores are Diagon Alley: 3 Harry Potter: 1  
> Diagon Alley remains champion! (Though Harry will someday return... no matter how little he might want to. This is where the bookstores live after all!)
> 
> Thank you to all the commenters and those who kudos-ed!  
> There's a little more explanation about Harry's sensory sensitivity in the chapter above, but only time will tell just how deeply it runs... At least by the time he gets to Hogwarts he'll be a little better adjusted from his time in Diagon! Hopefully!  
> And once Harry's gets to school and into classes we'll be seeing some more flashbacks to some of the lessons he learned in Azkaban; and possibly some flashbacks about... less academic moments too.  
> Has anyone noticed the pattern in the professors that were sent to help Harry with his shopping? :)
> 
> Next time: The Hogwarts Express departs... or books, a toad and copious amounts of sweets; a tale of unlikely friendships


	7. The Hogwarts Express

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Hogwarts Express starts its long journey from King's Cross to Hogsmeade station.
> 
> A lot of things can happen during those hours of travel...

The first of September dawned bright and crisp… and with the bustling, hurried activity of practically every wizarding teenager in Britain attempting to get last minute packing done, travel arrangements finalised, and younger siblings corralled.

Platform 9¾ began to fill with people as early as nine o’clock, an hour before the Hogwarts Express would arrive and a whole two hours before it would leave, and as time ticked by more and more wizards and witches came through the dilapidated fireplaces, the muggle visitor’s access from King’s Cross station and the designated apparition points, crowding the platform with hundreds of bodies.

Harry found he was rather glad he’d arrived early and escaped the worst of the chaos.

Alastor Moody had shown up in his room at St Mungo’s at eight fifteen that morning, long before the expected media crowds could start to gather around the hospital awaiting Harry’s departure.

It was the first time Harry had seen any of his four rescuers from Azkaban in over a month and admittedly, out of all of them, ‘Mad-Eye’ Moody was not the one he’d expected to see again any time soon.

(“Dumbledore, Bones and Fudge have been dealing with the paperwork and media fallout mostly,” Moody had gruffly explained as he looked over Harry’s packed trunk, magical eye focused intently on making sure everything necessary was inside. “You’ll be seeing the headmaster soon enough, but I doubt the other two can get away from their work for a while- no matter how much Fudge might want the photo opportunity,”)

The old auror had made sure Harry hadn’t left anything behind in his room (that false eye of his really was useful- Harry was sure he’d never would have found the pair of socks that had crept under the bed otherwise), took care of the copious exiting paperwork a frazzled mediwitch had handed them on their way out (Harry had already made sure to say goodbye to both his regular healers and the familiar patients of the Janus Thickey ward the night before, correctly assuming he might not have time in the morning) and promptly side-along apparated him to the platform at nine o’clock on the dot.

Like any good auror would, Moody took his time scoping out the place for potential dangers (again, his false eye made that task fairly easy), and stayed close to Harry until the scarlet steam engine pulled in at ten, warding off any overly curious families that strayed too close.

After finding Harry a suitable compartment (not too close to the engine, close enough to the exits for quick evacuation, ‘CONSTANT VIGILANCE!’) and double checking for any threats and/or snooping journalists (of which there were none, Harry suspected most of them were camped out in St Mungo’s lobby expecting him to leave at any moment), the grizzled wizard gruffly bid him farewell with a final adage to ‘take care who you make friends with’.

…

…Finally.

Harry got the distinct impression by the end of the whole fiasco that Moody wasn’t too experienced with, nor fond of, children. Especially not ones that had grown up with Death Eaters, considering the suspicious looks he kept flashing whenever Harry spoke. The fact he kept muttering ‘one year to retirement, just keep on assignment Moody, keep on’ to himself whenever he thought Harry wasn’t listening just reinforced this impression.

(Harry had tried not to think of some of the bloodier stories he’d heard about ‘old Mad-Eye’ from some of the Death Eaters in the tower. Tried, being the operative word. At least he’d been able to keep his old nightmares about the veteran auror firmly behind his occlumency shields for the duration of his presence, or else he might have actually panicked)

Ah well, it didn’t really matter now.

It was ten thirty according to the great clock on the platform and Moody was long gone, replaced by a swarming crowd of witches and wizards, cats and owls, children and parents, trunks and suitcases and cages and oh dear Merlin was Harry glad to be secluded in a compartment away from all the noise and the constant, CONSTANT flow of magic.

It was a little odd to think that none of the wizards or witches out there could feel what Harry could whenever they raised their wands to levitate a trunk or fix a child’s ruffled robes.

Upon leaving Azkaban, and indeed during his first few trips to Diagon Alley, he’d thought being able to feel what he felt was the norm for all witches and wizards. Even after his sensory sensitivity had been properly diagnosed he hadn’t entirely realised just how unusual actually being able to sense magic itself was. But over the last month, as the testing had eventually concluded and the incredulous reactions of his healers had grown more pronounced…

( _‘What do you mean you can TELL where all the hospital elves are?!’ ‘A heartbeat? From your WAND? Seriously?’ ‘Exposure to dementors from such a young age… It’s unprecedented. Who knows what else it might have caused?’_ )

Well… put simply, it was now clear that Harry’s oversensitivity to magic was fairly unique.

Heck, there’d even been several callously irritating healers whom had seen his ability to ‘feel’ magic as some miraculous power instead of something that was legitimately liable to cause him great pain and disorientation, and Harry couldn’t help but suspect that maybe they hadn’t looked as hard as they could for a solution to his sensory sensitivity just so he could ‘retain the miraculous gift’ as one particularly insensitive young mediwitch had said.

…thank Merlin he didn’t have to go back to deal with them until next summer. For now, the constant tests and check-ups were over. The regime of potions had been condensed down to a single dose of a specialised nutrition supplement at each meal. He was even medically cleared to fly a broom once the time for lessons came.

Harry was good and ready to be on his way to Hogwarts, and it showed.

He was already dressed in his plain black Hogwarts uniform, robes and tunic unmarked but for grey accents ready to be filled in with his house colours. His hair was neatly tied back, a few strategic locks brushed over the scar on his forehead to keep him from immediate recognition. His trunk was safely stowed in the rack above him and he had his book bag at his side, containing reading material for the long trip ahead, his coin pouch and his wand. The compartment door was cracked open in invitation for anyone who might want to sit down-

(-he’d managed to keep Moody from warding it, arguing that he shouldn’t hog a whole compartment to himself and he’d need to deal with the wizarding public at SOME point-)

-and his gaze was fixed out the window at the bustling crowd beyond, searching in vain for Neville’s blond mop or maybe Theodore’s neat brown cut. Not many children seemed to have boarded the train yet, instead partaking in lengthy goodbyes with their families, and Harry found himself wondering if someday he might do the same. He could just imagine Uncle Padfoot waving like a lunatic from the platform as the train pulled away, grin wide upon his face…

“Is anyone sitting here?” a bossy sounding voice demanded, cutting through Harry’s daydream.

Turning abruptly to the compartment door, Harry came face to face with two girls. The one in front had a mane of bushy brown hair, rather large front teeth and was clearly the one to have spoken judging from the imperious look on her face. The girl behind her was shorter and meeker, with wavy russet-gold hair and a fringe long enough to hide her eyes.

There were two standard Hogwarts trunks standing beside them in the doorway that Harry recognised from the most advertised displays at the luggage shop he’d been to with Professor Sprout, and both girls were dressed in muggle attire.

“I’m Hermione Granger and this is Sophie Roper,” the brown haired girl continued before Harry even had a chance to respond to her earlier enquiry. “Professor McGonagall told us in Diagon Alley that we should find a compartment early before they all fill up, but I think we should also get to know some of the others in our year. Are you from a wizarding family? It must be awfully fascinating to have grown up around all of this…,”

As Hermione spoke (seemingly without pausing to draw breath as she did so), she dragged her trunk into the compartment without any further invitation, drawing a mortified expression from poor Sophie who seemed to be frozen in the doorway.

It didn’t take much deduction to surmise that both girls were muggleborn, despite their opposite demeanours.

“…very best school of witchcraft there is of course, and we don’t even have to leave the country,” Hermione was STILL talking as she now dragged the other trunk in, though Harry had lost track of her train of thought a few sentences ago. “The books are all fascinating of course, but I do hope we aren’t too far behind having grown up outside of the whole culture. It’s a real pity they didn’t introduce us to the magical world earlier, don’t you agree? Of course, I already tried some simple spells when I arrived…,”

Harry met poor Sophie’s gaze as she watched Hermione essentially kidnap her trunk, and she fixed him with a pleading, apologetic expression that said a lot more to him than her companion’s ongoing rambling did. He offered her a small, uncertain smile, and patted the cushioned bench beside him.

Sophie’s eyes flickered to Hermione (whom was now heaving up her trunk onto the opposite baggage rack, and was STILL TALKING) before taking a tentative step across the threshold. She made a small gesture to the brown haired girl with a worried look on her face.

‘Is this okay?’ it seemed to say.

Harry shrugged slightly and his smile softened, patting the seat more firmly.

‘I don’t mind. Sit with me?’ he hoped was what he was communicating back.

A visible wave of relief seemed to cross Sophie’s face and she let out an audible exhale as she slumped onto the bench, unnoticed by Hermione who was now levering up the other trunk with going on about… er, it was featherlight charms a second ago but now she was talking about underage wand use? Or something?

“…would be ever so useful if we were allowed to practice more at home, but the professor was very clear that we could only start to use them once we were on the train to school,” Hermione finished as she slid the other trunk into place with strength such a petite form seemed unlikely to naturally have. “Anyway, my parents wanted me to come out to say goodbye before the train leaves for good, so I’ll be back later. Sophie, are you coming?”

The brown haired girl finally turned around to focus back on the other people in the carriage, and did a bit of a double take at seeing Sophie already splayed out on the (admittedly very comfy) seat beside Harry. The shorter girl seemed to stiffen a little at being addressed, and immediately began to pick at her hands as her gaze flickered to Hermione.

“My parents had to get to work,” Sophie said in an almost whisper, eyes darting around the near empty carriage. “You can go on. Thank you for handling my trunk but I… I think I need to sit down for a bit,”

“Oh. Okay then,” Hermione said awkwardly, looking briefly to Harry before looking out the window. “I’ll be back soon,”

And with that, the hurricane of wizarding trivia and bushy brown hair was gone, leaving Harry and Sophie alone.

They looked at each other.

“Is she always…?” Harry uncertainly began to ask.

“Always,” Sophie wearily confirmed, shoulders slumping and her gaze going to her hands, bitten nails scraping against each other.

They sat like that, the air silent but for the distant bustle of the platform outside.

“…my name is Harry,” Harry belatedly introduced himself, making Sophie look up again.

“Sophie,” she returned with the slightest hint of a smile.

\-------

Sophie was not talkative.

Her voice was reedy and naturally soft, and Harry got the impression she was a little embarrassed of it… but it also meant that she didn’t bat an eye at his own hiss-like rasp.

It was always nice to talk and not have his conversation partner comment on it in pity, or worse, flinch and back away.

Unfortunately, it also meant that both of them were naturally very quiet, and thus easily talked over by pretty much everyone that passed by in the hallway beyond their compartment.

Harry debated shutting the door more than once as clusters of rambunctious older students walked by chatting and laughing, but there was still room for at least four more in their carriage… and he was holding out hope that Neville and/or Theodore would show up to take some of those spaces before Hermione returned.

…that girl sure was… something.

After a bit of coaxing (with pauses in between to accommodate for loud students passing by) Sophie revealed that she’d met Hermione during the muggleborn orientation to Diagon Alley, and they’d exchanged a few letters over the summer since. The brown haired girl was nice of course, Sophie had emphasised, but she was also a little overbearing, tending to open her mouth and proceed to not close it whenever she got nervous or came across a topic she knew something about (which was often).

From there the quiet conversation drifted to their school subjects (Harry dug out ‘One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi’ from his book bag and they both spent a while pouring over the animated illustration of a fully grown venomous tentacula) and their hobbies (Sophie shyly asked if Harry had heard of Tolkein’s works and in response he’d pulled out his bookmarked copy of ‘The Return of the King’ from his bag) and before they knew it a final whistle blew and the train began to move.

Hermione still hadn’t returned to the compartment, but Sophie merely shrugged, knowing from her experience in Diagon Alley how easily the girl could get distracted. Harry had a feeling that no matter how nice Sophie insisted Hermione was, she was more than happy to get a break from the whirlwind of knowledge for a little while.

(Unbeknownst to both Harry and Sophie, a certain redheaded boy a few cars down was currently being subjected to a bombardment of questions once he’d accidentally let slip on the platform he belonged to a large wizarding family. Godspeed and good luck Ron Weasley, you poor boy. You aren’t getting away anytime soon)

The train left the buildings of London behind and began passing by fields of sheep and cows. No one else came into their compartment, apparently two first years huddled over a book were not worth disturbing, and they fell into a companionable silence while examining the silently shrieking image of a mandrake on the page before them.

That was when the toad came in.

Neither of them noticed the grey, warty amphibian at first. It too, seemed untroubled by the occupants of the compartment, crawling through the open door with nary a sound and a single minded fixation on reaching the opposite window.

It had made it roughly half-way across the carpeted floor when Sophie looked up for a moment, and froze.

She nudged Harry softly in the ribs, and he too looked up to see the creature slowly making its way across the compartment. Slowly, carefully, Sophie manoeuvred the heavy book fully onto Harry’s lap and drew her feet up onto the seat, eyes wide and bright behind her fringe.

She didn’t look scared or disgusted by the warty creature, in fact she almost seemed… excited.

As quick and nimble as a striking snake, Sophie suddenly leapt off the seat and captured the toad with both hands, letting out a strangely Aunt Bella-like laugh of triumph as she lifted the squirming creature above her head.

“A toad!” Sophie crowed, turning to face Harry with her eyes alight and her reedy voice as loud as he’d ever heard it. “Quick, what species do you think-?”

She abruptly stopped, toad awkwardly in hand over her head, her cheeks going a bright red that clashed spectacularly with her hair as she seemingly realised just what she’d done- and in front of an audience none the less.

They stared at each other a moment.

And then, silently, Harry reached into his book bag and retrieved ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’.

The stunned look on Sophie’s face was rather comical, but hey, Harry was used to much, MUCH stranger behaviour where he grew up.

(He told her so, and complimented her on her toad catching technique. She blushed again, but accepted the praise none the less. He meant it, even ‘ _orange-pale-frogcatcher_ ’, the best hunter in Azkaban, would have been impressed by her skills)

\-------

“Sorry, but have you seen a toad at- TREVOR!”

Harry looked up from the unreasonably large section on magical frogs and toads in ‘Fantastic Beasts’ that he and Sophie had been perusing for the last ten minutes (Harry turning the pages while Sophie kept a firm grip on the squirming amphibian) to see none other than Neville Longbottom standing in the doorway, his blond hair plaited into countless short braids reminiscent of the wrapper laced ones Alice had woven a month ago.

“Neville! Is this your toad?” Harry exclaimed happily, a buzz of warmth settling into him as he laid eyes upon the boy he already considered a friend. He’d been starting to doubt he’d see either of the boys he’d previously met on the express today.

“What species is he?” Sophie immediately asked, before blushing and mumbling: “I mean, sorry for picking him up without permission…,”

“Oh no! I should thank you for catching him,” Neville quickly protested, reaching out to take the toad from Sophie’s outstretched hands with a relieved smile. “He’s been getting away from me constantly all summer. I think this is the fastest he’s ever been recovered without a summoning charm involved. Thank you- er…,”

“Sophie Roper,” Sophie shyly introduced herself. “You’re… one of Harry’s friends?”

Eyes widening in surprise, Neville’s gaze locked onto Harry’s as if asking REALLY? A smile twitching on his lips, Harry rolled his eyes and nodded firmly at him, gesturing to the empty seat opposite in invitation.

“I am? Er- I mean, yes I am,” Neville quickly stammered out, a pleased blush dusting his cheeks, and he took a few hesitant steps into the compartment to sit opposite Harry. “We met at the hospital,”

Sophie quirked an eyebrow at the word ‘hospital’ but seemingly discounted that question for now in favour of:

“So, what kind of toad is he?” she repeated, not quite managing to hide her eagerness.

“Er… A common warty-grey crossed with something, I think?” Neville answered uncertainly, scratching his head with his toad free hand. “My great Uncle Algie was the one who bought him for me. Grandmum took me to get my wand while he was browsing, so I didn’t get to find out Trevor’s exact breed,”

“And how did getting your wand go Neville?” Harry quietly asked as Sophie eagerly flipped to the page on warty-grey toads in the book on his lap.

Neville beamed at him, shifting Trevor to his other hand as he slipped a delicately carved wand out from a holster hidden under his sleeve (Harry found himself wondering where he’d gotten the useful looking leather brace from, he hadn’t seen anything of the sort during his numerous ill-fated trips to Diagon Alley), and held it up to the light.

“Cherry and unicorn hair,” Neville explained eagerly. “And it actually LIKES me, I can feel it! My dad’s wand never felt right to me… I guess he knew what he was talking about when he upset gran,”

The expression on Neville’s face turned wistful at these words, but any further slip into melancholy was interrupted by Trevor making a daring leap out of his hands to freedom.

\-------

An hour, three Trevor escape attempts and three expert Sophie captures later there was a loud clattering out in the corridor and a smiling, dimpled woman pushing a trolley positively packed full of sweets stopped outside their door.

Out of the three children in the compartment Harry by far had the most money on hand, so he took it upon himself to buy the snacks for the rest of the trip.

(He still had roughly 35G left over for the year, having wisely limited himself to purchasing only seven new texts on his excursion to Flourish and Blotts with Professor Snape. He was now the proud owner of two large cookbooks, a reference text on common household charms, a vampire fiction by one Gilderoy Lockhart, some literature on house elf culture that had caught his eye, a book of admittedly childish hexes and a bulky, leather bound history of Azkaban Island)

However, with Sophie being muggleborn and Harry being… well, prison-raised, he left most of the actual selection of the treats to Neville. They ended up with a savoury pumpkin pasty and a sweet cauldron cake each, followed by a sizable pile of chocolate frogs to share and a single liquorice wand the length of Harry’s forearm that they split between them.

Harry made sure to pace himself by eating the delicious treats as slowly as possible. Even though he could now stomach substantially more food than he had straight out of Azkaban, he still couldn’t eat very much in one sitting.

Conversation between them, when there was any, was predictably quiet and unrushed, slowing even further when they paused to eat. The most excitement during the trip thus far had been Trevor’s multiple Neville-defying acts of escape-artistry, but he was no match for Sophie, whom eventually shyly revealed she’d wanted to be a herpetologist in primary school and thus had spent many hours at her local river… hunting.

The sheer excitement on her face when Harry had revealed he could talk to snakes had been worth the risk of Neville’s rejection, but the boy had taken the news rather well considering the reputation of parselmouths amongst pureblood wizards.

“Well… that accent had to come from somewhere, right?” Neville had just awkwardly shrugged at Harry’s revelation. “It doesn’t make you evil or anything…,”

Now THAT innocent comment had led to a rather awkward explanation about the generally unflattering public opinion of parseltongue and those few in recent history who could speak it for the uninformed muggleborn in the compartment… which in turn became a brief history of the most recent wizarding war with a short primer on Grindelwald for context, alongside a hurried account of Harry’s near-celebrity status and his childhood ‘accommodations’ that had left Sophie fuming at the ministry’s perceived incompetence.

(“You and the rest of the wizarding world Sophie,”)

It was approximately half an hour after the sweets trolley had passed that anything really notable happened, and by that point they’d mostly finished the haul Neville had purchased on Harry’s behalf.

It started, as many things do, with the sound of running feet out in the hallway and the yells of some irritated prefect in their wake.

They’d left the compartment door open (though it was clear by now that Hermione had either missed the train or found somewhere else to sit) so when Theodore from Madam Malkin’s, dressed impeccably in his Hogwarts robes, went sprinting past like a dragon was on his heels all of them were witness to the strange sight.

A moment later, having apparently caught a glimpse of the occupants of the compartment on his wild run, Theodore was back, eyes fixed upon Harry and a panicked air about his person.

“Hide me,” he said flatly, further sounds of feet approaching outside in the hall.

Blinking once in surprise, but with no real time to think, Harry merely lifted up his feet onto the seat and Theodore gladly took the opportunity to dive into the concealing shadows underneath, making Sophie squeak in alarm and Neville nearly drop Trevor.

Not a minute later another first year boy, graceful, dark skinned and carrying a fine toothed comb of all things, came speed walking down the hall with a thunderous look on his face, peering into their compartment with clear suspicion.

“You wouldn’t have happened to have seen a boy come running past here in the last few minutes?” he asked coolly, fixing his icy gaze on each of them in turn and making Neville go worryingly pale when he ran a scathing eye over his multiple braids.

“Yes,” Harry answered simply, and both Neville and Sophie shot him incredulous looks. “Someone ran by about five minutes ago, in that direction,”

He pointed in the direction Theodore had been heading before diving into their compartment, keeping steady eye contact with his presumed pursuer.

_-‘The best lies always have a hint of truth in them,’ Aunt Bella had often said. ‘Tell part of the truth, and act like you have nothing to hide. Because if you can do it right, then you honestly won’t,’-_

“Thank you,” the boy said in a clipped, irritated voice, before turning on his heel and stalking off down the corridor in the direction Harry had pointed. “Theo, get out here and face me!”

Harry silently counted to sixty in his head before casually getting up and sliding the compartment door completely shut for the first time since he’d entered it. He turned back to stunned expressions on Neville and Sophie’s faces.

“You can come out now,” Harry directed to the seat he had recently occupied, and slowly a slightly rumpled looking Theodore slid out from underneath, looking much relived.

“Thanks,” Theodore (Theo?) murmured stiffly.

“Are you alright?” Sophie timidly asked, taking in the contrast of his perfectly fitted uniform and his wildly uncombed and messy hair. It was almost a match for Harry’s when it was cut too short, and quite different to the neat style he’d seen on the boy during their first meeting… Wait, that other boy had been brandishing a comb. Harry suddenly had an inkling of why Theodore may have been running.

Theodore shot her a look that said ‘what do you think’ but said aloud:

“Fine,” Theodore paused, then added. “As long as Zabini doesn’t come back,”

“You’re Nott,” Neville quietly stated.

Theodore immediately went rigid, turning slowly to face Neville as if noticing his presence in the compartment for the first time. Neville, strangely enough, was similarly stiff and taut, looking at Theodore with some kind of unspoken enmity in his eyes.

Harry’s own eyes widened as finally he made the connection in his head. He knew of the Nott family… Heck, Phineas Travers had even given him some warnings about one Quentin Nott, one of the Dark Lord’s oldest followers… who was an elderly widower with only one, young child… and who were recently the only living members left of the ancient house. Merlin, the Nott family was-

“…not what?” Sophie innocently asked, shattering the sudden tension.

Theodore blinked and spluttered, Neville’s cheeks went a flustered pink and Harry’s quickly spiralling thoughts were unceremoniously tossed out the window.

“I mean, he’s Nott!” Neville squeaked, his abrupt moment of composure gone.

“Not what?” Sophie repeated, frowning in confusion. “What is he not?”

Theodore buried his face in his hands, rigid posture visibly slumping as the argument grew louder, and Harry felt the strangest urge to giggle.

“Not not, Nott!” Neville repeated insistently, gesturing bewilderingly at Theodore. “He is a Nott!”

“Not a what?!” Sophie repeated again, growing testy.

Theodore let out an audible groan behind his hands and Harry actually had to supress a chuckle as Sophie and Neville dissolved into an extremely confusing argument that would have been much easier to resolve had they written down exactly what they were trying to communicate.

“Would you like to borrow a brush or comb…er, Theo?” Harry asked tentatively as both Neville and Sophie got louder than he had ever heard him before. “…is it okay if I call you that?”

Peeking a single narrowed eye out at Harry from between his splayed fingers, Theodore looked around the increasingly noisy compartment helplessly for a moment-

-and nodded, a faint blush spreading across his cheeks as he quickly tried to flatten his unruly hair with his fingers.

With a relieved smile, Harry went rummaging through his bag once again.

(It seemed that his guess about Theo merely being awfully shy had been spot on. Merlin knew how often HE fell back on his etiquette lessons when he didn’t know what to say)

\-------

(“You could have just SAID that Nott was his last name,”

“…I’m sorry,”

“Don’t worry about it Neville, you both figured it out eventually,”

“…,”

“Is there some kind of wizarding feud between your houses? Like in Romeo and Juliet?”

“In what?”

“In what?”

“…,”

“You know, Shakespeare…? Never mind, it’s not a wizarding thing, sorry for mentioning it…,”

“No the, er- feud thing is actually quite accurate if it means the same thing to muggles as it does in the wizarding world. Remember what we said about… you know, the war?”

“Isn’t Shakespeare a playwright? I think I saw some books of his in London, they looked interesting, but I went with a Lovecraft compilation instead because the format was more familiar…,”

“…does anyone else want this last chocolate frog before I eat it?”

“Oh! Go ahead Theo,”

“I’ve already had two Theo, its fine,”

“…but now I’ve read some of Lovecraft, I can’t help but wonder if Shakespeare’s language may have made more sense in retrospect…,”

“…Harry, frog? …Harry?”

“…,”

“…,”

“Hmm? Ah, yes, the frog is all yours Theo!”

“…*munch*munch*…,”)

Four first year children and one toad sat together in a compartment on the Hogwarts Express, sometimes talking, often reading, but always soft, polite and to the point.

Two purebloods with starkly differing upbringings. A muggleborn with strange interests that had never made her many friends. And a half-blood who was still so used to silence he rarely even thought of breaking it himself…

Thus, the seeds of a friendship are planted between four unlikely individuals who are ever so similar… yet unimaginably different.

In other compartments, students excitedly chatter with (or at) their friends, catch up on last minute summer homework, or even prowl the halls of the train, looking out for a boy with messy hair, green eyes, marks winding up his arms and a lightning bolt scar… but with no further clues as to the looks of one Harry Potter, none of them get very far.

(Except for the one boy who did… but he was honestly more interested in getting his hair back under control without Zabini’s interference, participating in the quiet yet delightfully politics-free conversation and finishing off his mooched chocolate rather than swooning over the boy-who-was-sitting-across-from-him)

And as the sun set and the evening rolled in, the Hogwarts Express- finally- reached its destination.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the comments and kudos! I feel like I'm getting a little repetitive with this, but really: I feel all warm and fuzzy inside whenever I see people are enjoying what I've written!  
> For those who guessed last chapter, yes the pattern in the Harry's escorts to Diagon was that they were all heads of houses... whom may or may not have been subconsciously sent in the order of house preference Dumbledore would like for him :)  
> Harry's actual sorting will be in the next chapter- any guesses as to which house he will be in?
> 
> Also, a note on Hermione and Ron while I'm here. While I do like their characters, they are not major parts of this particular story. I like putting in little 'glimpses' of what the major characters from canon are getting up to while my story progresses away from them, but that doesn't necessarily mean they'll be appearing all that often. I hope you'll enjoy the occasional one-or-two paragraph antics they'll get in the future, but they likely won't be major factors in the plot. (They're both a little 'too loud' for this version of Harry to be entirely comfortable around after all)
> 
> Next time: The Sorting Ceremony... or an outsider's perspective on one Harry Potter


	8. The Sorting Ceremony

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A certain individual watches the 1991 sorting ceremony and observes the new generation... with mixed feelings.
> 
> Meanwhile, Harry discovers that the Hogwarts house elves have a tendency to go overboard.

The Great Hall of Hogwarts was as magnificent and dazzling as ever.

It seemed that no matter how many years passed, no matter how the uniforms or banners may change, no matter what the ambient weather shining down through the bewitched ceiling happened to be, the Great Hall always seemed to be practically glittering on the night of the Welcoming Feast.

Of the Sorting Ceremony.

Professor Quirrell was trying (and failing) to make innocent small talk with Professor Snape while they awaited the arrival of the first year students, occasionally casting his gaze over the four tables of older students before them.

Slytherin’s table, as expected, was dignified and composed, reunited social groups spaced evenly beside each other so there was no need to shout their private affairs to the rest of the hall…

…unlike Gryffindor’s table, loud and rambunctious, where two red-haired students in particular seemed to be determined to broadcast their every thought to the entire school population.

Again, as was predictable, Ravenclaw’s was the quietest of the tables, with the vast majority of its members either still wrapped up in the books they’d been perusing on the journey here or locked in softly spoken (but no less heated for it) debates with their peers.

And to nobody’s surprise, the students at Hufflepuff’s table appeared to be engaged in numerous hugs, hair-ruffles and pats on the back as friendly housemates reunited with each other after the summer.

He sighed irritably to himself, making Quirrell’s stutter notably more pronounced for the five minutes that followed.

As much as everything changed, everything stayed the same.

And as much as that was to be expected, that fact wasn’t as much of a comfort as he thought it would have been.

(Because if so many years and so much strife hadn’t changed things at Hogwarts, what else could possibly…? No. Don’t go down that path. That way lies madness)

A few more observant heads popped up at the student tables as Professor McGonagall slipped through the doors and discretely made her way up to Dumbledore’s chair. The twinkly old wizard smiled and nodded as she murmured to him a few seats away, before turning and making a quick gesture to each of the other three heads of houses.

Breaking off his ‘conversation’ (if the tiresome drivel from earlier really could be called that) with Quirrell, Snape pointedly turned away and quietly waved his wand over in the direction of Slytherin house, making his final head count as McGonagall, Flitwick and Sprout did the same for their own houses.

After a series of quick nods and quiet affirmations, Professor McGonagall left the hall again to fetch the first years now the older students were all accounted for.

Moments later and the whole hall was silenced as the great doors dramatically opened all the way, making room for the clustered line of first year students who followed McGonagall into the hall between the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw tables.

He scanned the group of eleven year olds with a critical eye, spotting more than one child with a striking resemblance to people he had once known… families whom had once been great allies or persistent enemies. Or even both.

The striking blond hair of a Malfoy with the typical features sharp enough to cut glass- the familiar nervous determination of a young Bones- bright green eyes, the shade of a curse that fixed upon him and-

An involuntary shudder went through him, making him avert his gaze before Quirrell could notice the reaction.

…now just what had THAT been?

Cautiously re-focusing his attention on the crowd of first years as McGonagall brought out the stool and sorting hat, his gaze locked upon the green eyed boy once again.

But Harry Potter was not looking in his direction anymore, instead pointing a reassuring smile in the direction of a soft faced boy with several dozen plaits woven through his short blond hair… and whom currently looked a few moments away from a panic attack.

A Longbottom, he realised after a few seconds of contemplation, though the lad had clearly inherited more of his features from his mother’s family than his father’s. A boy behind him (and the resemblance to the Nott family there was unmistakable…) laid what was probably meant to be a comforting hand on Longbottom’s shoulder, but the attempt looked so awkward it was impossible to tell if the gesture was staged or not.

Either way, such actions from a Nott to a Longbottom were… unexpected. Those two families had most decidedly been opposites on the ‘moral’ spectrum the last he had heard. Was this some form of unusual alliance perhaps, or a short-lived anonymous friendship from the train that would end the moment their names were called?

There was a girl he couldn’t place the features of rounding out the little cluster gathered around Potter, perhaps a Weasley if her hair wasn’t tinted so gold… But no, there was clearly a Weasley boy further back in line having what appeared to be a whispered argument with a bushy haired girl, and he knew there was only one set of twins in that family (thank Merlin). The girl with Potter was likely a mudblood.

A strange group of friends to acquire for a figure such as the ‘boy-who-lived’…

“Abbot, Hannah!” McGonagall suddenly called, cutting off his inner musings as he realised he’d completely missed the customary song, the sorting had begun and that he should probably be paying some kind of attention to the hat.

“HUFFLEPUFF!” the hat roared out a moment after it had been set on the pigtailed girl’s head.

And the sorting began in earnest.

Quirrell politely clapped with each yell from the hat, in sharp contrast to how Snape beside him was stoically unmovable but for the hint of a smile whenever a student was declared ‘SLYTHERIN!’ Dumbledore, of course, appeared only just short of cheering aloud for how wide he beamed with each new student’s house.

(Whether this enthusiasm was real or a disturbingly good act was something he still hadn’t managed to figure out after all these years)

“Longbottom, Neville!” McGonagall called, and the boy with many braids in his hair took an obvious deep breath (seemingly on the mudblood girl’s advice, if the soft whispering between them was any indication) before striding up to the hat… and barely avoiding tripping over on the hem of his robes along the way.

The hat took a long time for the first of Potter’s little group of friends, almost reaching a hatstall before finally calling out-

“GRYFFINDOR!”

Potter and the mudblood clapped wildly (the Nott boy surprisingly doing the same, if somewhat more hesitantly and with a grimace on his face) as Longbottom seemed to sink into the stool in relief. Shortly after peals of laughter followed all across the hall as the boy walked halfway over to his new table before realising he hadn’t yet taken the hat off.

With the hat returned to McGonagall by the stuttering and blushing boy, the sorting continued.

Scarcely four names passed before the next of Potter’s group was called.

“Nott, Theodore!” McGonagall read, and the boy notably stiffened, walking up to the stool with his back ramrod straight.

He waited for the expected shout of ‘SLYTHERIN!’ and… eventually got it, but not until nearly three minutes had passed in which the boy appeared to be having a silent argument with the hat.

Potter and the mudblood girl clapped for Nott anyway, and strangely enough so did Longbottom over at the Gryffindor table, earning him some odd looks from his housemates.

Most unusual, he thought as he watched the boy slink over to the regally celebrating masses at the green and silver table. Even Snape had a subtle eyebrow raised.

But no others seemed to note the oddity, and the sorting went on, names passing one by one until…

“Potter, Harry!” McGonagall called, and the whole hall descended into whispers.

“Potter, did she say?” “My mum said there wasn’t a chance they’d send him to Hogwarts this year…,” “Look at how thin he is!” “They say that long in Azkaban sends you stark raving mad,” “I wonder what house he’ll be in…,”

Harry Potter indeed appeared remarkably thin and haggard looking compared to his peers as he made his way to the stool, the familiar Azkaban induced circles under his eyes less pronounced than they might have been a month before, but visible none the less.

He had seen the papers of course. He’d been incredulous at first, and had nearly laughed himself sick after he’d gotten over the initial shock, but seeing the boy here and now… seeing the barely hidden scars circling those wrists, the unhealthy gauntness of that frame, the steely determination in those too-green eyes… A tremor he now recognised as apprehension ran through his being.

The boy must have been utterly drowning in accidental magic to have survived so long in a place like Azkaban. For one, those streaks of silver through the instantly recognisable Potter mess of black weren’t likely to be something he’d inherited from his mudblood mother…

It made him curious. It made him… cautious.

The hat slipped down over Potter’s glasses (though not the same design as his irritating father’s, they seemed oddly familiar…) and a sweeping silence fell across the Great Hall. The boy did not move. He showed none of the signs usually present when a student disagreed with the hat or had some opinion to make, no quietly moving lips, no frown.

He… honestly just appeared to be letting the hat get on with it.

“RAVENCLAW!” the hat suddenly shouted, after barely ten seconds on Potter’s head.

A massive cheer went up from the usually reserved Ravenclaws as the boy gracefully stood, practically gliding over to the blue and bronze table with a startling elegance for one so young. He seemed to briefly scan the hall, meeting eyes with the glum looking Longbottom at the Gryffindor table, the uneasy seeming Nott at the Slytherin table and the fiercely clapping unsorted mudblood, all smiles and without a speck of judgement on his face.

Seconds later he took his seat and was expectedly swarmed by his new housemates, cutting off the vast majority of the Great Hall’s view of the ‘boy-who-lived’.

“Roper, Sophie!” McGonagall loudly called out, reminding the rest of the (very noisy) students that there were, in fact, still others left to be sorted.

The last member of Potter’s group, the now confirmed mudblood girl (Roper was NOT a wizarding name) quickly stepped up to the stool as the last of the cheers and speculative murmuring quietened down. Of the four, she probably had the shortest sorting of the lot, with the hat barely touching her head before crying out:

“HUFFLEPUFF!”

And that was that.

…

It was then that he realised that somehow, by some strange turn of events, all four of the children whom had entered together in Potter’s little group had managed to be sorted into different houses.

Leaving Potter isolated and all but alone, surrounded by an extremely inquisitive sea of blue and bronze.

Voldemort smiled internally as he gazed through the eyes of his host, sending an involuntary shudder through Quirrell at the notion.

This could be interesting.

\-------

Harry had a headache.

Though considering his circumstances, this wasn’t entirely new nor was it unexpected.

While Hogwarts wasn’t as bright and relentlessly colourful as Diagon Alley had been, there was still an intoxicating buzz of MAGIC constantly present in the air that Harry found hard to ignore.

After all, the castle was subject to a number of powerful wards that rivalled even Azkaban’s, had a contingent of at least (from what Harry could feel) three hundred house elves constantly attending to various duties, and of course there were many, many, MANY more witches and wizards about than Harry had ever seen before, the vast majority of them fully utilising their wands to take care of simple tasks.

(He found himself incredibly thankful that relatively subdued candles and torches were being used for lighting and that the school uniform was predominantly black, or else he probably would have passed out by now from sheer sensory exhaustion)

For now, just as he’d done in Diagon Alley, his only real option was to just power through the ache and do his best to ignore as much of the stimulus as he could… but at least here, he could also distract himself with the astounding welcoming feast.

Oh, what a feast. It was incredible to behold. Never before had he ever seen such a bounty of food in a single place.

The dishes laid out on the tables for dinner were both varied and plentiful, with central trays full of every kind of meat or poultry you could imagine cooked in a staggering variety of different styles. Harry felt the urge to dig out one of the cookbooks he had sequestered in his trunk just looking at some of the roasts, casseroles, sausages, curries and steaks on display, simply to figure out how they’d been made.

As for the side dishes, there were separate platters of roasted, fried, steamed and boiled vegetables, freshly baked breads both in sliced loaves and individual rolls, odd savoury puddings baked in meaty drippings, sauces and gravies galore, tureens of several different varieties of soup, large bowls of fragrant rice and mashed potatoes, paper lined baskets of thick crispy chips and soft wedges of polenta… and for some strange reason, little bowls of mint humbugs.

There were pitchers of ice cold water, sweet lemonade and pumpkin juice scattered throughout the food that never seemed to empty, and every person at the table eagerly helped pass favoured foods and drinks around to those who weren’t seated close enough to serve themselves.

The house elves here REALLY must have missed having the full capacity of students to serve over the summer, as Harry simply couldn’t imagine such an astounding variety during other meals. The amount of work it must have taken to get so many different kinds of food onto the house tables all at the same time must have been stupendous.

Well, it was a feast after all, he supposed. Not an everyday occurrence.

After far more deliberation than he would be comfortable admitting (and a great deal of savouring the many scents coming off the table before making a decision) he ignored the frankly intimidating selection of meat dishes entirely and instead took a small bowl of thick pumpkin soup with a knotted roll of crusty bread.

And it was absolutely DIVINE.

Even the wonderful hospital food paled in comparison to this… though the small vial of sour tasting nutrition potion that appeared by his goblet was as familiar as ever.

Around him, many of the other first year Ravenclaws were eagerly trying bits of everything from the feast; even those from the richer families were unused to such a wide selection at one table. There was Michael Corner sitting to his left, and Morag ‘call me Isobel’ MacDougal to his right, both absorbed in their meals.

Stephen Cornfoot, Anthony Goldstein and Terry Boot were seated across from him, clearly friends prior to Hogwarts and thus easily chatting away by themselves between bites. Mandy Brocklehurst and Padma Patil were in some kind of debate already with Sue Li and Lisa Turpin further down the row, and Oliver Rivers, who was quietly eating and reading a large book at the same time, rounded out their house-year group.

Harry was seated right in the middle of the grouping of new Ravenclaws, and for that he was grateful. It meant that the older years were cut off from relentlessly questioning him… for now at least.

His year mates themselves, while as chatty and curious as any other person in the wizarding world he’d met so far, had thankfully withdrawn a little after the initial introductions (Harry just knew he was going to have trouble remembering all their names) so they could focus more on the delicious food.

And so delicious it was, the conversation had only barely started up again at the conclusion of the mains (Harry himself had only just finished wiping the last drop of creamy soup from his bowl with his last mouthful of bread at the time, avoiding the inevitable questions for as long as he possibly could) when the demolished platters of food and dirty plates vanished in favour of dessert.

If Harry suspected the house elves had gone a little overboard before, he was sure of it now.

There were bowls of mousses and jellies, various cakes and baked slices both small and large, ice creams by the block in a whole rainbow of colours, pies and tarts in several different flavours, piles of both fresh and candied fruits, doughnuts and sticky puffed pastries still hot and steaming from the kitchen… and the same bowls of mint humbugs, which had been the only ‘course’ from the mains that had remained virtually untouched.

Almost completely full from the soup he’d eaten earlier, Harry limited himself to a finger-thin slice of a latticed cherry pie with a small spoonful of vanilla ice cream on top… and even then he wasn’t quite able to clear his plate.

(He had a feeling the remaining dried cherries from the northern tower in his trunk, as delicious as they were, were going to remain uneaten for a while if every meal at Hogwarts had even a fraction of the selection from the opening feast)

He allowed himself to fade into the background as conversation began to start up again in earnest amidst his fellows, concentrating on savouring his cherry pie as much as he was able… and honestly somewhat intimidated by how loud his new classmates seemed to be. Even in Ravenclaw (the quietest, book obsessed house, according to multiple opinions he’d heard) it seemed that Harry was a bit of an outlier when it came to social interaction.

More than once as his belly filled and his attention could be more easily lifted from his plate, Harry found his gaze drifting over to the Slytherin table in front of him, or over his shoulder to Hufflepuff and Gryffindor behind. Neville, Theo and Sophie (whenever he could glimpse them in between the sea of other students around them) all seemed as out of place as he felt, their natural quietness leading to them either ignoring or being ignored by their fellows entirely unintentionally.

(Except for Theo. His blank expression and laser focused gaze on his plate looked quite purposeful as both Zabini from the train and a boy with white-blond hair simultaneously tried to get his attention. At least his hair was in order enough that Zabini wasn’t brandishing a comb this time)

Their sorting’s had been… well, they hadn’t really been a surprise per say, as each of them DID possess certain stereotypical traits of the houses they’d been sorted into-

(-Harry was still reeling from the idea that Professor McGonagall had him picked for the right house within a few hours of meeting him, but he supposed his blatantly obvious hunger for new information and knowledge WAS a celebrated trait of Ravenclaw-)

-but he hadn’t expected them to be divided up so evenly.

He’d half expected to go into Slytherin himself, for example, or Theo to join him here in Ravenclaw, or both Neville and Sophie to go to Hufflepuff or Gryffindor together.

But the hat’s word was final, and it had chosen traits that had kept them all apart.

(And oh… a sorting HAT of all things! He was going to have some WORDS with those traitors back in the tower in his next letter! Swimming across the Black Lake as a test of placement indeed Uncle Padfoot…)

…

What’s done was done, he supposed. But at least he hoped they could all remain friends despite their house divides.

Eventually, the remains of the puddings also vanished (drawing some scattered cries of dismay from a few students whom hadn’t eaten their dessert quite fast enough), and as one the hall’s focus went to the staff table where Headmaster Dumbledore was getting to his feet.

Harry could see Professors Flitwick and McGonagall, Sprout and Snape (which was actually a bit of a relief, having PROOF the man was actually a teacher and their excursion to Diagon hadn’t been a bungled kidnapping/murder attempt after all), Hagrid the giant groundskeeper whom had guided them across the lake and Filch the caretaker whom Uncle Padfoot had drilled too many warnings into Harry’s head about to avoid-

(-he wouldn’t be surprised if there was going to be an enmity there equal to Professor Snape’s considering some of the tales Sirius had told him-)

-and a number of other teachers that Harry didn’t know by name or by sight, many of whom he’d felt the curious gazes of both during his sorting and afterwards. A thin woman with a gauzy shawl and a permanently vague expression (that was probably meant to look mysterious) in particular had been staring unashamedly, and a turban wearing man sitting beside Professor Snape (and whom had been looking justifiably nervous about this seating arrangement) had been glancing at him on and off subtly ever since he’d entered the hall.

As Harry’s gaze passed over the two overly interested professors, a spike of pain entirely unlike the usual dull throb of his sensory headaches cut directly through the scar on his forehead. Tensing up minutely, he found himself tuning out the headmaster’s speech in favour of closing his eyes to ease the pain.

It wasn’t by any means the worst pain he’d ever felt-

( _-cold fingers and colder breath, dragging him down, icy metal sliding over his arms as he began to involuntarily convulse, a face beneath a hood that no living being should ever have the misfortune to see, a mockery of a loving kiss-_ )

-but pain like that in particular brought back nasty memories, nightmares that even his budding occlumency shields were seldom able to entirely suppress. Breathing slowly and deliberately, he waited until the unusual spike faded away… but the irrational fear that had accompanied it remained.

The healers had always been so impressed at how relatively unscathed Harry appeared for having almost a decade of Azkaban to cope with. But only an idiot would believe it hadn’t affected him at all.

“…everybody pick their favourite tune, and off we go!” the headmaster’s cheery voice interrupted Harry’s souring thoughts, and suddenly the whole hall burst into completely uncoordinated song.

Startled, it took him a few moments to pick out the golden ribbon of lyrics above the staff table, and a few moments more to reluctantly join in with Morag’s (sorry, Isobel’s) version to the tune of ‘Scarborough Fair’.

(The smile he got from her in response was blinding)

By the end of the song, by at which point nobody but two red-heads at the Gryffindor table were singing to the tune of a funeral dirge, Harry’s headache as a whole had lessened a little and he had a small smile back on his face.

He was at Hogwarts now, and far away from Azkaban.

He should be thinking of happier things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you who guessed Ravenclaw, well done!  
> While this Harry could have easily made it into any of the four houses, one of his strongest motivations in his new life outside of Azkaban is discovering and accumulating knowledge previously denied to him, making him a stand out candidate for Rowena's house.   
> That and the fact that he has no particular bias towards or against any one house (thanks to the... cosmopolitan variety of people he was raised with/by), meant that Harry felt no real urge to argue with the sorting hat for placement elsewhere, hence RAVENCLAW!  
> Whether or not Quirrell's 'guest' has the right idea about Harry being all alone in his new house however... well, you'll just have to wait and see! :)
> 
> Thank you again to those who left comments and kudos last chapter!
> 
> Next time: Harry's first week at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry... or, riddles. Why did it have to be riddles?


	9. Lessons and Friendships, New and Old

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry makes his way through his first week of school, and notes some important differences... and similarities... to his education in Azkaban.
> 
> And once the weekend arrives, Harry plots to finally reunite with his new maybe-friends from the train... though he is far from the only one plotting.

If there was one thing in particular that Harry learnt in his first week at Hogwarts, above all else, it was that he was utterly useless at riddles.

Having been raised in near-complete isolation from both the wizarding and muggle worlds, poor Harry was at quite a disadvantage when faced with wordplay and puzzle solving. After all, if he hadn’t even heard about something a riddle was meant to refer to, then how could he possibly solve it? It wasn’t like riddle-solving had been part of his otherwise rounded education back in Azkaban!

(In fact, if Harry hadn’t already read the Hobbit and thoroughly enjoyed Gollum and Bilbo’s riddles in the dark, he mightn’t have even known what a riddle WAS before coming to Hogwarts)

Now normally this kind of trivial weakness wouldn’t have been a problem for Harry… had he not been sorted into a house with quite an unusual method of guarding their common room.

The knocker on the door to the Ravenclaw tower could thankfully be quite lenient if Harry could come up with a decent explanation for whatever outlandish answer he had to the riddle of the hour-

( _-‘What goes on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon and three legs in the evening?’ ‘…an accident prone, mutant troll with really fast regeneration?’ ‘…What.’-_ )

-but often he’d just wait for one of his more critically minded house mates to come and open the door for him and save him the embarrassment.

Other than his difficulties in accessing his house tower however, Harry’s first week at Hogwarts could easily be counted as the best week out of his whole life thus far.

His house common room was, in a word, beautiful. It was done up in delicate silks of blue and bronze, with magnificent views from stately windows, statues of historical figures placed all around and stars painted across the domed ceiling. It had three separate fire places (one at each compass point of the circular room with the exit at the last), enough comfy chairs and couches to easily sit three quarters of Ravenclaw’s student population at once and was packed with bookshelves lining every single spare section of wall space… including the walls of the staircases leading up to the dormitories.

His dormitory was similarly done in pleasant shades of blue, with a curtained four poster bed (the mattress soft enough almost to swallow him whole) and a small study desk laid out for each boy. There was a fluffy cushioned bench against the windowsill for stargazing, a wood fired heater with an always-full kettle on top and teacups in the corner, and a bathroom with showers that never seemed to run out of hot water.

Of course, there were no more sleep-aiding potions for Harry like there had been in St Mungo’s, and he couldn’t leave his dormitory at night to go walking around as he’d often had to do back in the northern tower in order to turn his brain off and get some sleep… but as the ambient temperature was always warm and the beds were always so comfy, he quickly found that four nights out of five there was really no need for his once customary pacing; even his routine occlumency exercises seemed to grow easier while in the embrace of a warm quilt.

(He loved it all)

The house elves had slowly worked their magic as the nights rolled by, colouring the formerly grey accents of his uniforms to a royal blue and embroidering Ravenclaw’s crest on the breast of his shirts once they’d been through the clothes hamper in the bathroom, returned neatly folded on top of his trunk at the foot of his bed.

Harry found himself thankful he’d sewn his name into each piece of his clothing when Michael Corner’s unlabelled robes ended up on his trunk by mistake. (Twice. In one week) If the boy hadn’t been so obviously taller than Harry he may not have gotten them back.

Meals in the great hall, while never as truly extravagant as the welcoming feast had been, were always filled with a staggering variety of foods and drinks that changed from day to day.

Harry had made it a mission of sorts to try something new each meal, and within a few days he’d already discovered a great fondness for steamed carrots, roast chicken, potatoes (in nearly any style) and treacle tart… alongside a great distaste for black pudding, bacon (though oddly enough he still liked its smell), green beans and anything flavoured with coffee.

(It was an odd novelty, having the option to completely forgo eating foods he didn’t like the taste or texture of, and he planned to take full advantage of it while he could)

As for lessons, Harry found nearly all of them fairly easy in theory, thanks to his better than average background knowledge in the subjects via his Azkaban tutoring… though when it came to practical work he was just as clueless as anyone else. Practicing incantations and movements with an inert stick was quite different from trying to actively cast with a wand after all. After his first day Harry quickly developed a habit of skimming through the relevant textbooks before coming to classes so he could get some basic practice in.

Though admittedly he didn’t take this revision quite as far as Hermione Granger, whom had somehow ended up in Gryffindor, and whom also seemed to be able to recite each book by heart whenever called upon in their shared classes.

(Harry had barely seen the girl since she’d rushed into their compartment to grab her uniform as the Hogwarts Express was pulling into Hogsmeade… and honestly, he was a little glad of that. Hermione was a tad too loud for him)

He enjoyed Transfiguration and Charms despite his initial difficulties in picking up the correct casting techniques (Professors McGonagall and Flitwick were fast becoming his favourite teachers), he dug right into Herbology with a relish (so long as he had reasonably thick gloves on, of course) and he had been outright astounded by Astronomy during his first lesson… the sky had been so CLEAR…

_-Rodolphus Lestrange was probably the quietest of the inmates of the northern tower, stoic and silent even when the others were given into bouts of outraged ranting or contagious laughter._

_Harry rarely ever saw him alone during the day, usually only ending up in the man’s company while he was with Aunt Bella (there were many occasions upon which he could remember her roping her husband into giving demonstrations during their etiquette lessons) or with Rabastan (often seen shaking his head at the antics his younger brother got up to with Raleigh Gibbon… often at the expense of Augustus Rookwood)._

_But every so often, on the rare evenings when the eternal cloud cover of Azkaban gave way…_

_On those clear, crisp nights, Rodolphus would come and tap a sleeping Sirius on the shoulder (always getting some incomprehensible mumble in response), before sneaking Harry outside; past the dementors and into the courtyard where they could watch the starry sky above._

_Harry was usually far too sleepy to entirely remember the changing phases of the moon, the explanations of star behaviour that could affect certain ritual magics, or the numerous boring constellations Rodolphus named and plotted out on a piece of parchment between them for later perusal… but all the same, he always listened eagerly to the tales of magical creatures the older man would spell out amidst the stars, full of dragons and unicorns and fairies and nifflers and thestrals…_

_Yes, Rodolphus was a quiet man, but when he felt like it he could have quite a bit to say. And while Harry may have learned more useful skills with some of the others in the tower, his occasional lessons in Astronomy would always hold a special place in his heart-_

Professor Sinistra didn’t teach like Rodolphus did by any means (for one, the subject of magical creatures was in an entirely different class at Hogwarts; divided between DADA for the dangerous beasts and an elective course for third years and up for the more useful ones) but the sheer beauty of an almost eternally uncloudy sky was worth the night of interrupted sleep Astronomy lessons inevitably caused.

…but unfortunately, not all of his classes were so easily enjoyable.

For example, Harry was quickly disappointed with Defence against the Dark Arts, which was taught by the turban wearing professor he’d caught staring during the welcoming feast. Professor Quirrell seemed… well, oddly terrified both of his own subject and of his students. He stuttered incomprehensibly through lectures and never turned his back on them if he could avoid it, making whatever useful information he had to impart near impossible to decipher through layers of unnecessary caution and butchered words.

History of Magic was also a great let-down. Taught by a ghost whom obviously hadn’t changed his lesson plans in a couple of centuries and called out a different class roster every lesson (invariably several decades out of date), Harry found himself revising from his Azkaban papers from Phineas Travers’ history lessons far more often than his current notes as a result.

_-‘I swear, Professor Binns has utterly ruined the last century of magical history studies for Britain!’ Phineas could often be heard muttering over the sheets of painstakingly scribed history notes he copied down from memory. ‘Bloody ghost…,’_

_A lawyer by trade before his discovery and incarceration as a Death Eater, Phineas Travers had the best understanding of wizarding history out of anyone in the northern tower; though there were some notable gaps in his knowledge in areas not related to law, war and/or legal repercussions in some way. Thus, despite his imperfect knowledge, he had been eventually conscripted to fill that gap in Harry’s education, much to the man’s initial consternation._

_Now Phineas wasn’t a BAD teacher per se-_

_(-indeed, Harry likely had a better background knowledge of Grindelwald’s war and the history of the British Ministry of Magic than most of his cellmates-)_

_-but he was… well, he was probably the least ‘hands on’ of all his various tutors in the northern tower. Harry had lost count of the times the man had sneakily taken a nap during their scheduled lessons, for example._

_Additionally, perhaps due to the fact that their cells shared a wall, or perhaps because one day he’d be expected to teach Harry about it in detail, Phineas by far got into the most arguments with Sirius over their differing ‘interpretations’ of the…_

_…ahem, ‘most recent British wizarding war’._

_(And after overhearing many of these debates between them, despite not having had any formal lessons on the war in question, Harry now knew probably much more than he was comfortable with about both the Dark Lord’s ‘doctrine’ and the numerous ‘virtues’ of the Order of the Phoenix. Plus a number of nasty swear words to boot. War, Harry had learnt early on, was VERY complicated)-_

Even if he disregarded everything else he’d learnt from those reluctant lessons, at the very least Harry now knew that Phineas’s long suffering grumbling about one Professor Binns had been very, VERY justified. The ghost’s drawling drone of a voice could suck the excitement out of even the most bloody goblin wars, and he never meaningfully interacted with his class. It was a small wonder the ghost hadn’t been exorcised yet by enterprising students, ‘benign undead’ protection laws or not!

By the Friday of that first school week the only subject Harry hadn’t yet had was Potions, as the other Potions lesson marked on his weekly schedule had been on the day the express had arrived. Now Harry had known he would be decent at the subject, if only for Donnell Jugson’s incessant tutoring of him back at the tower…

_-‘Potions is not an easy subject,’ Donnell would always state at the start of every lesson. ‘Even the slightest mistake can cause a potentially life threatening reaction,’_

_Due to the lack of a cauldron, a reliable source of fire, or indeed any ingredients in the northern tower, Donnell had always been limited to teaching Harry the most basic of basics about brewing… but made up for it with a huge amount of useful trivia and theory, especially in relation to plant based potions._

_(Herbology was Donnell’s true passion in life, but his agency for teaching THAT was even more limited than potions, seeing as the only living plant in easy reach was Harry’s cherry tree)_

_However, beyond all else, what Donnell taught him the most about was safety procedures and precautions to take while brewing._

_‘Many people are incapable of making decent potions, and many more don’t have the artisan’s ‘touch’ required to make potions that are beyond average,’ Donnell had lamented. ‘But what every person IS capable of with enough study, no matter their natural talent, is knowing how to identify incoming potion disasters and being able to prevent them… or at least being able to buy enough time for an evacuation,’-_

Soon enough, Harry became very glad for all those lessons of safety.

For unlike Donnell’s lessons in the tower, Potions at Hogwarts had a heavy emphasis on practical tasks and there was always a risk of accidents in every single class… especially when the most intimidating professor in the school, ex-Death Eater Severus Snape himself, was busy swooping around startling easily scared first years into making silly mistakes.

…

Which, weirdly enough, was Harry’s salvation in this particular subject.

You see, Professor Snape’s clear enmity of Harry hadn’t improved since their trip to Diagon (if anything, it had gotten worse), and had his first Potions lesson not gone the way it had, Harry was certain the teacher would have tried his best to sabotage him in the subject at every turn.

But as it happened, during that first lesson in Potions with the Hufflepuffs-

(-after being quite humiliated by not knowing EXACTLY where to find a bezoar. In his defence, ‘in any decent magical first aid kit’ WAS a perfectly legitimate answer even if Professor Snape didn’t seem to think so-)

-he happened to identify an imminent explosion over at the table manned by Justin Finch-Fletchley and Ernie Macmillan, and his shouted warning to ‘DUCK!’ saved about half the class from being splattered with boil-inducing sludge.

He’d earned two points for Ravenclaw (neatly replacing those he’d just lost from the bezoar question) from a begrudging Snape for his quick action, much to everyone’s surprise.

Afterwards, the professor didn’t appear quite so hostile to him, perhaps reluctantly impressed by Harry’s safety knowledge or grateful he’d prevented multiple trips to the hospital wing. No matter the reason, Snape’s previous negative attention transformed into a less than ideal (yet still much preferable) complete disregard of Harry’s existence. Which was progress!

(And trust him on that. In Azkaban, the moments when the other inmates had one by one begun to ignore Harry over actively trying to attack him had been some of the most important milestones of his life. Things had only improved from there after all!)

All in all, what Harry found was the most difficult about all of his lessons so far (grudge holding teachers and new practical work included) had not been anything related to the curriculum. To be honest, it was the headache inducing process of finding all of his classrooms in the labyrinth of the castle, closely followed by the trials of actually getting to all of them on time.

There was a massive number of staircases in Hogwarts (many of which moved of their own accord whenever they felt like it), endless confusing passages and hallways that seemed to go nowhere more often than not, paintings whose occupants regularly moved around practically every frame in the school (thus making them useless as reliable landmarks) and a huge, HUGE amount of seemingly useless rooms in between the in-use classrooms that could easily turn a new student’s head upside down.

It didn’t help that every once and a while the classrooms themselves seemed to change position too.

(Harry had even overheard a couple of fifth years complaining about this phenomena, confirming that the ever-changing layout of the castle wasn’t just in his head. He was just waiting for the day when an in use classroom moved so he had some physical proof he wasn’t imagining it all)

Filch and his cat, Mrs Norris, prowled the corridors constantly, looking for unfortunate students whom had ended up in out of bounds areas-

(-which oddly enough encompassed most of the third floor much to Harry’s confusion, seeing as he’d missed the bulk of Dumbledore’s speech during the welcoming feast because of the sudden pain in his head and the subsequent involuntary trip down memory lane-)

-but he was actually quite helpful with directions to students who were polite and didn’t have the misfortune of being caught in a restricted corridor at the time. Out of any individual in the castle, Argus Filch probably knew the layout of Hogwarts the best. (Or was at least more use than the ‘helpful’ ghosts who often misremembered crucial details… like that students couldn’t typically walk through walls)

Knowing this, and of Uncle Padfoot’s numerous (and in hindsight, likely exaggerated) tales about the old squib, Harry actively tried to stay on the caretaker’s good side.

Peeves the castle poltergeist, on the other hand, was not so easily swayed to any student’s favour, and Harry just did his best to avoid the troublemaker after an incident with several walking sticks on the stairs to Ravenclaw tower.

And as for Harry’s problem with feeling magic… well, as the healers had rightly guessed, he found himself getting better accustomed to the constant buzz of magical energy that hung over Hogwarts like a shroud as time passed. After his first night sleeping in the Ravenclaw dormitories the worst of his headache faded away, and as the days rolled by he found it easier to focus on the here and now rather than the ambient magic around him.

But no matter how accustomed he became, how much more easily he was able to ignore it… Harry found he was never entirely unaware of it, the magic prickling at the back of his mind. Occasionally the words of that insensitive medi-witch came back to him… about the ability to sense magic being a gift… however, distracted by his new schoolwork and honestly still a little salty about her tactlessness, Harry ignored the thought time and again. He had better things to do.

It was nice, that first week at Hogwarts, when everyone was still getting their bearings and had more important things to focus on than the boy-who-lived… but sadly, as many things do, this peace didn’t last for very long.

\-------

The first weekend of the school year marked a notable increase in attention towards one Harry Potter, now classes weren’t in session and most students had more time on their hands.

On that Saturday morning Harry had been on a mission, and therefore didn’t immediately notice the change in attitude towards him, instead focusing upon somehow reuniting with his three maybe-friends from the train… by any means necessary.

(He’d seen them all in class at some point over the last week of course, but there had always been a definite house divide down the rows of desks and/or workstations all of them had been too timid to cross. The most interaction Harry had gotten with them since the sorting had been hesitant waving from Neville, solemn nods of greeting from Theo and small smiles from Sophie, and by this point he was genuinely aching for more meaningful exchanges)

Like most Ravenclaws were, Harry was up far earlier than the rest of his alternatively-sorted year mates on the weekend (the older prefects had set up a house-wide alarm for eight a.m. during the week, and eight thirty on weekends) so he had some time to eat breakfast before he could ambush his targets.

Today the house elves seemed to have a ‘sweet and fluffy’ themed meal out on the tables in celebration of the weekend, with large stacks of pancakes, pikelets and crepes artfully defying gravity as centrepieces on each table. There were bowls of steaming scones and tiny raisin buns scattered about, artfully made waffles and crumpets by the dozen arranged on platters and a truly bewildering assortment of jams, honeys, butters, nutty spreads, preserves, syrups, creams and even ice creams wedged in between.

Harry could still spot the customary fresh fruit, muggle cereals, hard boiled eggs and trays of toast that were always available every morning no matter what else was on the table (for the pickier eaters, he assumed), but they were practically buried underneath the new array of other foods. Large teapots filled with a variety of different teas, coffees and hot chocolates alongside jugs full of various juices and milks completed the table setup.

Shaking his head with a fond smile at the customary over-hospitality of the Hogwarts house elves, Harry found himself a seat at his gradually filling house table (grimacing at the nutrition potion that automatically appeared beside the goblet as he sat) and decided to try a few scones while he waited for his targets to appear.

He’d barely decided on a sweet cherry conserve and was internally debating whether to try the whipped cream, double cream, clotted cream or crème fraiche (the house elves had helpfully labelled all of the near identical looking pots) when someone rather loudly cleared their throat right behind him.

Turning on the bench with half a jam-smeared scone in hand, Harry found himself face to face with three first year boys in Slytherin robes.

(And that was his first inkling that something was… off about this meeting. Just who wore their uniform on the weekends?)

The one in front, pale and sharp featured with near-white blond hair, was looking down his (rather pointy) nose at Harry with a disturbingly hungry look in his eyes, and the two hulking boys flanking him were wearing dull expressions more suited to contract bodyguards than eleven year old children on a Saturday morning.

“My name’s Malfoy, Draco Malfoy,” the blond boy said haughtily as their eyes met, sticking out his right hand almost directly in Harry’s face. “And you are Harry Potter I presume?”

Harry blinked, caught off guard by the extraordinarily arrogant introduction. While impeccably formal, it was anything but polite.

“Yes, that’s me,” he answered slowly, carefully placing his sticky scone back down on his plate in order to politely (if gingerly) shake the offered hand. “…Can I do something for you?”

Puffing up proudly with a smug smirk ticking up on his mouth, Draco dropped Harry’s hand a fraction of a second too fast to be considered respectful and crossed his arms.

“I’ve noticed you’ve been sitting alone a lot Potter, and I feel that is a terrible shame for one like yourself,” Draco said pompously in what was likely meant to be a friendly tone but instead came across as degrading. “I would like to offer you my friendship, and with it my knowledge of the better sort of wizards you should associate with,”

For about a second, Harry just stared at the boy. And then he realised that all of his formerly chattering housemates around him had gone deadly silent.

(Mora- Sorry, Isobel, in particular had frozen with her goblet of pumpkin juice half way to her mouth, and one of the third years further down the row was fixing an expression that could shatter glass on the arrogant interloper… not that Draco noticed)

The name ‘Malfoy’ tickled at the back of Harry’s mind, alongside a great number of associated rants from Aunt Bella in particular about ‘double-crossing’ and ‘faithlessness’. The entirely random fact that this boy was in all likelihood Bellatrix’s blood nephew briefly made itself known (besides the grey eyes, there was really no resemblance) before Harry suddenly caught movement from the other end of the Ravenclaw table in the corner of his eye.

Uh oh, the prefects were on their way over.

He had to do something!

“I… see,” Harry said outwardly calm, but with his mind racing on the inside. How could he get out of this without getting either of them into trouble? This boy was clearly not very situationally aware, considering his boastful confidence in the face of so many glares from the students around him, and if Harry simply flat out said no Draco would probably pitch a tantrum and cause even more trouble.

One of the hulking boys behind Draco fidgeted with the sleeve of his robe almost nervously, and Harry latched onto the movement with a sudden idea blossoming in his mind.

Hmm… He had a couple of lessons from Aunt Bella he hadn’t the chance to put into practice outside the northern tower yet, and it seemed like the one to scare off ‘overly-interested purebloods’ (her words, not his) could come in handy right now.

Harry smiled, slowly, deliberately and all three boys immediately stiffened.

“That is a… curious offer, but I fear I will have to decline,” Harry said softly, the usual harsh rasp of his voice elongating into a rolling ‘not-quite-parseltongue’ hiss that genuinely creeped out most who heard it. “You don’t appear to understand why I might have chosen such a course of action and your… presumptions otherwise are slightly… well. I’m sure one as ‘noble’ as yourself can understand why they might be a ‘tad’ offensive? Besides, we have only just met, and I don’t believe I know either of your… companions,”

The two bodyguards practically jumped in fright as Harry’s gaze lazily tracked over them both.

He didn’t know what it was exactly about this pattern of speech and tone of voice that so freaked purebloods out when his normal raspy voice usually only garnered the occasional flinch-

(-Aunt Bella, whom had been grinning somewhat dementedly when teaching him this manner of ‘emphasising his parseltongue in common speech’, had point blank refused to tell him. Nor had any of his comically disturbed cellmates after he’d demonstrated the act to them. Uncle Padfoot in particular had seemed torn between wanting to laugh and wanting to flee-)

-but Harry was glad it seemed to be just as effective on those outside Azkaban as it had within. With any luck, they’d all be scared into submission before the prefects arrived and got one or all of them in trouble.

“Ah- Gregory Goy-,” the one on Draco’s left began in a flustered fashion.

“Vince-,” the one on Draco’s right nervously cut him off.

“What, you think you’re too good for me or something?!” Draco cut them BOTH off in an outrageously offended tone that didn’t entirely manage to cover how shaken the boy was.

Harry looked back at Draco with an extremely unimpressed expression on his face, making a very visible flush of colour rise on the boy’s cheeks. Draco opened his mouth, closed it, and then (possibly seeing the advancing prefects coming down the table) turned around and stormed off.

“Come on Crabbe! Goyle!” he barked over his shoulder to his two frozen companions, who shot each other incredulous looks before hesitantly following him back to their own table.

Harry’s shoulders slumped and the tense air he’d deliberately cultivated drained away. Well, that could have gone a lot worse, considering. And it looked like Draco (or should he just call him Malfoy?) wouldn’t be returning to bother him for a while… or at least until whomever had encouraged him to ‘befriend’ Harry managed to coax him to try again.

(Harry for one highly suspected the boy’s father as the instigator, again thinking back on Aunt Bella’s often loudly proclaimed opinions of her slippery brother-in-law. It seemed unlikely that the younger Malfoy would have approached him so tactlessly on his own accord)

Letting out a deep sigh, Harry turned back to his scone (still hot, the house elves always made diligent use of warming/cooling charms at meal times after all), and took a bite without adding any cream at all.

It was delicious.

(He didn’t notice the odd looks he was getting from his house mates, a strange mix of horrified, confused and impressed and it wasn’t over his choice of breakfast to say the least. Nor did he notice that several other students that had been eyeing him all morning were now staying firmly in their seats)

\-------

Oddly enough, it was Theo who sought out Harry first, approximately five minutes after the ‘Malfoy incident’.

Which was probably for the best, seeing as he’d discovered such a liking for the texture and flavour of scones with plain cherry conserve that he’d completely disregarded his surroundings in order to savour the small amount he could eat of them to the fullest.

“Malfoy is being entirely insufferable,” was what Theo flatly said as the boy slipped into the empty bench space beside Harry. “I hear I have you to thank?”

Harry wordlessly passed Theo the other half of his current scone.

Theo immediately slathered it with an unholy amount of hazelnut-chocolate spread.

(Secretly, without meeting the other’s gaze, they both smiled in relief)

…

(And the rest of Ravenclaw table could only look on in utter bewilderment as the one whom had quickly become known as the ‘boy-who-didn’t-socialise’ sat in comfortable silence next to a friend)

\-------

Sophie was next to enter the great hall, hair still mussed from sleep and dressed in her muggle day clothes for the weekend.

She hesitated for a moment at the doors, spotting the lone snake at the Ravenclaw table, before being spotted in turn by Harry whom was full enough of delicious scones to pull his gaze up from his plate in order to notice her.

He waved to her with a beaming smile, Theo at his side giving a smaller, tentative gesture with his hand at his prompting.

(None the less, she still hesitantly asked a Hufflepuff prefect if it was all right to sit at another house’s table before joining them)

(Though even if the answer had been a no, somehow it felt unlikely that would have stopped her)

\-------

Gryffindor house as a whole were usually the latest to bed and latest to rise, it being an open secret that they were the only house that didn’t have an enforced bedtime curfew (a fact envied by many Ravenclaws in particular) so long as everyone was in their common room or dorms by the time the castle’s curfew as a whole came about.

Neville was the last of their little group from the train to enter the great hall as a result (though he had beaten a fair number of his year mates), hair done up in several dozen braids as per usual, and had to actually be fetched over to Ravenclaw’s table by Harry (whom had by this stage finished three and a half scones and was now completely full) after entirely missing the little gathering upon his first glance.

(He was beaming all the same as he sat down in between Theo and Sophie)

\-------

None of them really spoke at first, all in the process of eating or waiting for the others to finish eating (cough*Harry*cough), but there was a silent sense of companionship there that hadn’t faded since the train ride to Hogwarts after all.

(They’d spoken enough, however, to figure out that all four of them had independently plotted to meet up with the others now the weekend was here, sending a warm and fuzzy feeling squirming around Harry’s chest at the thought)

Now that they were all out of their colour coded uniforms and with nowhere to go for the day that would forcibly separate them, the houses that divided them didn’t feel like as much of an obstacle to maintaining their tentative friendships as it once had been.

The prefects and professors that passed by the multi-housed group at the Ravenclaw table gave them wary looks, but… they remembered the awkward and clumsy boy from Gryffindor who was always last to be paired up in class.

They remembered the silent girl that even in the eternally inclusive and friendly Hufflepuff common room so often ended up secluding herself with her muggle reptile books.

They remembered the stubborn boy who flat out refused to interact with his insistently political Slytherin housemates, refusing to rise to the bait time and again.

And of course, they all had kept an eye on the famous boy-who-lived whom hadn’t yet once joined in with the quickly forming study and social groups of the Ravenclaw first years.

They all had watched, and remembered, and seeing no harm being done, they let them be.

…though Professor Quirrell had been particularly twitchy that morning after noticing the little group reunited, seemingly having some kind of internal conflict at the sight.

(Professor Sprout subtly hinted that maybe he should go get a calming draught from the hospital wing, but the stuttering DADA professor had paled remarkably at the suggestion. Poor man. ‘He really would have been better off sticking to muggle studies,’ was the unspoken accord of the other staff by the end of that first week)

(…oh they didn’t know how right they were)

\-------

Staying at breakfast was out after another half-hour, seeing as there were now so many students there it was hard to hear themselves think, let alone speak in their unanimously quiet voices.

And so they left, trying to find somewhere to hold their long delayed conversations without interruption.

The gardens and lawns outside by the quidditch pitch and lake were tempting to claim a place in… but they were already starting to fill up with social groups taking advantage of the sunny morning either to chat noisily or to play boisterous games.

The entrance hallway or the winding circuits of the dungeons could provide a cover of anonymity to their conversations… unfortunately however, due to the traffic into the great hall for breakfast both places were quickly becoming unbearably noisy.

An abandoned classroom may have been promising for a private place to talk… of course, if it weren’t for the obvious crowd of curious students whom were gradually homing in on Harry with hunger in their eyes. Secluding themselves away from a teacher’s supervising gaze seemed like it might end poorly.

(One Gryffindor second year had even been bold enough to shout out some indecipherable question addressed to ‘Potter!’ from across the entrance hall. Whatever it was had made one of his year mates smack him upside his head. Harry felt it was probably for the best he hadn’t heard exactly what had been asked)

And of course, their four separate house common rooms were out of bounds for obvious reasons. Cross house friendship or not, it had been made quite clear to them all that their private house common rooms were off limits to those not sorted there- officially for administration purposes, unofficially to try and corral some of the worse house rivalry ‘disputes’ that inevitably accrued amidst the rowdier students.

So, after some quiet deliberation, to the library the four went, avoiding as many people as possible as they climbed the stairs.

Madam Pince had taken one look at them, briefly remembered what she’d seen at breakfast, and wordlessly pointed them over to the table furthest from the door, half-hidden behind the encroaching stacks of books.

They all sat down with the feeling of a great weight being released from their shoulders. There was comfort amidst the silence of the library, and in the sure knowledge that noise, irritating personal questions and the general clamour that most of their fellows engaged in were all but forbidden here.

“So, how was your first week?” Harry quietly asked them all after they’d settled in, a small smile on his face.

\-------

They ended up having to meet again in the library the next day to finish the lively (if softly spoken) conversation that had ensued.

(By the end, all of them felt like they’d said more to each other than they had spoken to others during the whole previous week combined. And knowing them… it was probably true)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, thanks for all the kudos and comments on the last chapter!
> 
> There are a few more flashbacks in this chapter, rounding out who exactly taught what back in the northern tower, but there are still more to come! And there will likely be a few more events from the DADA's professor's... guest's perspective in the future too. After all, this Harry is completely unconcerned with a certain third floor corridor... but an important someone else is most definitely taking interest.  
> Er... I feel I may have been a bit hungry when writing the descriptions of the various feasts the Hogwarts house elves cook up... I just loved the descriptions of the feasts in JK Rowling's books, and I couldn't help but add a few of my own! Because honestly, knowing how loyal house elves behave, why wouldn't they go a bit overboard with most any meal they could? (Especially when catering to so many hungry teenagers...)
> 
> The 'correct' answer to the riddle in this chapter was 'man' or 'human'. (Four legs in the morning= crawling toddler. Two legs at midday= walking adult. Three legs at night= Elderly with a cane) Though Harry's convoluted answer could probably be considered technically correct enough to warrant him access. In this universe, I've headcannoned that so long as the student can reason their answer well enough, the Ravenclaw doorknocker will probably take pity on them (especially if its close to curfew or they're running late)... thankfully for poor, riddle deprived Harry.
> 
> Next time: The adults all have a conversation... or, Harry has sent a long letter.


	10. A Courtyard and a Staff Room

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some adult perspective on current events- from two very different places.

It was a typically gloomy day in Azkaban, with not much to say about the quality of the weather besides ‘not raining’ and ‘not quite cold enough to put ice on the bars… yet’.

Things had fallen back into a familiar routine now the youngest inmate of the northern tower had left… though with marked, lonely gaps where scheduled lessons had once been.

The leaves on the cherry tree had begun to turn various muddy shades of red and gold as the weather had slowly gotten colder, and the very last of its summer bounty of fruit had been harvested and preserved less than a week ago.

All in all, it looked to be a typical day for the inmates of the Death Eater block…

…or at least it did until a dementor, carrying two envelopes, came floating into the tower. As solemn (and frankly, creepy) as ever, the creature drifted past its kin and into the courtyard… and unceremoniously dropped both letters into the lap of the meditating form of Florian Mulciber underneath the cherry tree.

The Death Eater blinked his eyes open, momentarily disoriented, before his eyes fixed upon the familiar neat scrawl of the addresses written on the creamy parchment.

“HARRY’S LETTERS ARE HERE!” he shouted out gleefully as he sprung to his feet, completely ignoring the retreating post-dementor, his voice echoing disconcertingly around the cold stone walls.

If dementors had eyes, it was pretty certain they’d be rolling them in exasperation as this yell drew a chorus of other excited squawks and cheers from all around the tower. And seconds later, there was a veritable stampede down the staircase led by a large black dog whose tail was wagging fast enough to cause a breeze.

Sirius Black smoothly transformed back into a man and practically threw himself into Florian’s arms with a joyful whoop, picking the slightly smaller man up, whirling him around and earning a disgruntled whack on the head for his efforts.

“Sorry! Sorry, I’m just so excited!” Sirius chuckled as the rest of the tower population gathered around the tree in a significantly more dignified manner. “He’ll be at Hogwarts now! I can’t wait to hear who won the bet-,”

“Oh, our Harry is Hufflepuff all the way,” Rabastan drawled with a fond roll of his eyes, cutting off Sirius’s incoming excited rant. “I don’t know why the rest of you even bothered wagering otherwise,”

At this Antonin Dolohov scoffed.

“That’s the long shot option and you know it ‘Bastan,” Antonin said imperiously. “Knowing how Sirius has indoctrinated the boy, he’ll be a Gryff for sure!”

“So sure you’ll bet another few cherries on it?” Edward Selwyn, whom was the one in charge of the betting ledger on this matter, asked slyly.

“I’m keeping my money on Slytherin,” Bellatrix chirped with a wink to her husband. “This is your last chance to change your wager dear,”

Rodolphus simply smiled and shook his head, shooting a conspiratorial look in Augustus Rookwood’s direction. Out of the whole population of the tower, they were the only two whom had bet on Ravenclaw, much to the bewilderment of teams Gryffindor and Slytherin.

Augustus, at least, had been a Ravenclaw himself (the only one in the tower in fact, since poor Barty had passed), but Rodolphus ‘consummate Slytherin’ Lestrange placing a bet on that house had been incomprehensible to most of the other inmates… more so after he’d refused to explain his reasoning, an odd smirk on his face.

(Team Hufflepuff, whom consisted solely of Rabastan Lestrange and Raleigh Gibbon, appeared to be taking it as a joke bet and no one in the tower had taken them seriously, least of all themselves. Edward, as the ledger keeper, hadn’t bet on anything at all)

Florian (whom was betting with team Slytherin) cleared his throat and held up the letters addressed to ‘Uncle Padfoot’ and ‘The Folk of the Northern Tower’, causing a hush to fall over the excitedly chattering and bickering group.

“Any last minute wagers?” he asked with a raised eyebrow, wiggling the group addressed letter slightly to grab their attention.

Phineas Travers (team Slytherin, but Antonin’s comment had got him wondering about Harry’s Gryff-like tendencies) and Donnell Jugson (team Gryffindor, but Raleigh had been trying to get him to defect to team Hufflepuff for a while, ‘for the sake of our former house’s pride!’) both seemed to be thinking a little, but the rest of the tower was quite clear on their bets.

“Flori, come on! I can’t stand the suspense!” Sirius (team Gryffindor, obviously) pressed, practically bouncing in place with anticipation.

With a deliberately dramatic flourish, Florian passed Sirius his own letter before breaking the seal on the one to them all as a whole.

The population of the northern tower seemed to hold its breath (even Sirius, whom hadn’t yet touched the seal on his) as Florian pulled out a generous folded stack of parchment, and opened up the first page of Harry’s lengthy missive.

He scanned the page for a moment, a somewhat pained expression appearing on his face that made the rest of team Slytherin’s expectant smiles falter.

“Ravenclaw,” he grumbled disappointedly.

Both Rodolphus and Augustus smiled knowingly amidst the exaggerated groans of their fellows and Sirius’s faux-outraged cry of ‘I CALL A FOUL!’

It was really quite obvious in hindsight.

\-------

“…and so we begin the first staff meeting of the school year in progress,” Albus Dumbledore calmly announced to the staff gathered before him as somewhere across the North Sea team Ravenclaw collected their winnings. “First, would the heads of houses give their reports on their newest members?”

Pomona Sprout, as expected, was the first to stand from her seat around the paper-strewn table, a beaming smile on her face. The head of Hufflepuff was notoriously the most involved in the lives of her students out of the four, and usually kept a very close eye on her smallest badgers.

“They’re all settling in well so far, and I believe I’ve already seen a few good candidates among them for prefects in the future,” the Herbology professor said with a smile. “We’re using our buddy system again this year with the third year students, and I must say Mr Diggory in particular has taken to the task with pride. I was a little concerned about Miss Roper at first, but it appears she has found a supportive group of friends outside of her own house,”

At this, she slyly looked over to Filius Flitwick, who chuckled good naturedly and got to his feet, standing on his chair so he wouldn’t disappear under the table doing so.

“My new ravens are also doing well, though I haven’t yet had the chance to organise my usual individual meetings with them yet,” Flitwick said with an apologetic shrug in the headmaster’s direction. “My OWL and NEWT student meetings have taken a bit more wrangling than usual this year,”

This earned a couple of knowing smiles from some of the professors in the room, no doubt remembering their own burgeoning study-panic at the beginning of their standard test years. Ravenclaw house in particular (followed closely by the more ambitious of the Slytherins) always seemed to need the most… guidance when it came to their studies, in order to make sure their students didn’t crash and burn from stress alone.

“I hope to have them scheduled and completed by the end of September so I can get a better idea of this group’s interests and study focuses,” Flitwick continued promptly. “Other than that, I’ve had reports from my prefects that a few of the new students have been having trouble with the door knocker… Mr Potter and Mr Goldstein in particular. I’ve been preparing a new compilation of riddles to add to the common room library for general perusal, and hopefully it should aid them in their access troubles,”

“Is there even any room left in there for more books there Filius?” Irma Pince asked amusedly.

“There’s always expansion charms!” the professor countered cheerily, garnering a round of knowing chuckles from the rest of the staff.

Severus Snape stood next.

“There are a number of firstborn heirs in this term’s Slytherin intake,” he said seriously, instantly dimming the formerly jovial air of the room. “There have already been some complaints from older students about new upstarts becoming… arrogant about their place in the pecking order. Mr Malfoy, for example, has been trying to order my prefects around,”

The eye roll that accompanied the dry tone of this statement made it clear what the potions master thought of this behaviour.

“Mr Malfoy’s father is on the school board, isn’t he?” Silvanus Kettleburn murmured contemplatively, rubbing his chin with his hook.

“Unfortunately,” Severus drawled. “And the boy has wasted no time in making sure everyone knows this little fact. I have heard no reports of bullying yet, but I fear it is only a matter of time. With any luck, I should be able to handle him without… exaggerated reports getting back to his parents, but I feel it is prudent I warn you in advance. Mr Malfoy, and to a lesser extent his friends, Mr Crabbe and Mr Goyle, should be watched carefully for… undesirable behaviour,”

This earned a round of solemn nods from around the staff room.

“And of your… non-pureblood students?” Aurora Sinistra pointedly asked.

“Miss Moon is Slytherin’s only new muggleborn, and Miss Davis and Mr Zabini are the only known half-bloods,” Severus answered without batting an eye. “The upper years have grown much more tolerant in the years since the Dark Lord’s fall, thank Merlin, but I have pulled them aside and given them the customary warnings none the less. Although in Mr Zabini’s case I feel his mother’s reputation overshadows the fact he had a muggleborn father. They all appear to be establishing themselves well amongst their peers,”

Severus sat down without any further comment, and Minerva McGonagall stood.

“Most of the new Gryffindor students have settled down, but I’m afraid there’s been a bit of conflict between the female students over dorm space already,” Minerva sighed wearily. “Miss Brown and Miss Granger managed to get into an argument on the very first night, and have been giving each other the cold shoulder ever since. I will keep an eye on them, but they seem to have reached a kind of truce for now that I am reluctant to tamper with. Mr Weasley, the youngest, also may have some incoming complaints about being repeatedly accosted by Miss Granger in the future, though he hasn’t come to any teachers about it as far as I know,”

“Your Gryffindors tend to be reluctant to go for aid without first trying to solve the problem themselves, Minerva,” Septima Vector commented. “Perhaps you should address it with them before the situation comes to a head?”

“I will consider it, but I’d rather not push Mr Weasley away from me if I can help it,” Minerva said with another heavy sigh. “He’s already heard tales about me from all his older brothers, or so I gather, and if I start getting involved in his personal matters this early I fear it will only reinforce the idea I am a strict and domineering professor,”

“You mean you aren’t?” Severus asked with a quirked eyebrow.

“Har har, you know what I mean Severus,” Minerva said flatly, though there was a smile twitching at her lips.

“Any other concerns on our newest students? Bouts of homesickness? Other illnesses?” Albus asked jovially as Minerva re-took her seat. “Entertaining anecdotes perhaps?”

There was a moment of silence, before Pomona stood again.

“He’s not one of my badgers, but I’ve noticed a lot of rumours going around about Mr Potter,” Pomona said warily, casting her gaze around the suddenly uneasy faces in the room. “Amongst the older students in particular. I’ve even caught one or two of mine making lists of questions they want to ask him, many of them completely inappropriate of course…,”

“I must say I’ve noticed the same,” Minerva added solemnly. “It seems many of my lions were expecting him to end up in our house, by virtue of his parents sortings. A few have even seemed insulted by the fact he ended up in Ravenclaw. No offence meant Filius,”

“None taken,” Filius sighed wearily. “I’ve already chastised enough of my fifth and seventh years in their OWL and NEWT meetings with me for planning to ‘interview’ Mr Potter without his prior consent for various projects. While I’ll admit his case is fascinating, it doesn’t excuse hounding him for information that is likely traumatic for him to recount,”

As one, every eye in the room flickered over to Severus as Filius finished speaking.

The potions master glared back at them.

“No. Comment,” he said through gritted teeth, and wisely, no one else mentioned Mr Potter for the next hour.

\-------

While the staff meeting at Hogwarts continued onto matters concerning the upper years, back in Azkaban the inmates of the northern tower were holding court over the contents of Harry’s bulky letters.

“He’s made friends with the Nott heir,” Phineas groaned with a hand over his face. “Of course he did. Even after I warned him,”

“Come on now Phin, he made friends with YOU, didn’t he?” Sirius smirked over his own, personal letter. “You, Mr. Phineas ‘the Dark Lord’s philosophy is perfectly valid’ Travers? One little boy less than half your age shouldn’t be any trouble for him,”

Phineas just flipped Sirius off without looking at him, muttering something under his breath about ‘see if I keep preparing you for the trial now…’ Sirius merely nudged him playfully with his shoulder in response before returning to his own letter.

“Hmm… hey Phineas! He says your lessons in history were much better than the ones he’s getting now with Binns,” Augustus called over as he examined the third page of the group letter. “Perhaps I should send him the method for an exorcism so a better History of Magic professor can finally be found?”

“I doubt the censors will allow that,” Rodolphus rumbled, still looking pleased from his win of Harry’s sorting bet. He had a couple of extra blankets and a woven basket full of dried cherries to show for it, as did Augustus.

Bellatrix, silently leaning against her husband’s side with page number five of the shared letter, looked troubled. As she read the name Longbottom once again upon the parchment, a pang of guilt shot through her heart.

She hadn’t even known there’d been a baby in the house when they’d…

Skipping the rest of the paragraph, Bellatrix swapped her page with the one Edward had just finished perusing, and said nothing that could bring down the currently light hearted mood over the rest of the tower.

These days, she, her husband and her brother-in-law were all fully aware that they hadn’t exactly… been thinking clearly on that night ten years ago in the Longbottom’s manor house, maddened with grief for their lost master. Perhaps it was for the best they hadn’t known of young Neville’s existence that night… or poor young Barty mightn’t have been the only one of them to have succumbed to Azkaban’s hopeless, deadly chill in the years since.

(She knew that Rabastan, at least, still privately mourned for the friend he had lost)

“He writes here there’s going to be flying lessons this coming week,” Donnell said with a fond smile. “With the Hufflepuffs. This Sophie girl sounds like she’s more excited about it than he is, and that’s saying something,”

“Mud-,” Antonin cut himself off at the warning glare from Sirius. “Muggleborns tend to be more excited about the stereotypical muggle-viewed aspects of witchcraft anyway if I remember right. The pointed hats, star printed robes, flying brooms and smoking cauldrons especially, at least back in my days at school,”

“True,” Rabastan shrugged. “Her blood status doesn’t mean she won’t become an unholy terror on a broom though. Remember that Hufflepuff beater back in ’74?”

Roughly half the assembled group, including Sirius, actually shuddered at this, having been present either on a house team or in the stands by the Quidditch pitch during those matches.

Louisa ‘Arm-Breaker’ Meadows had been muggleborn and likely still held the school record for most bludger strikes against opposing teams. She’d credited it to playing something she called baseball back at her muggle school in America before her family had moved across the pond. Thankfully she was transferred to the Hufflepuff reserve team after that year before her casualty count could get any higher.

(She’d begun playing professionally for the Hollyhead Harpies last Sirius had heard, but seeing as that was before his imprisonment she could very well be the team captain by now)

A sudden, horrified gasp immediately drew everyone’s attention over to Florian, whom had commandeered the second page of Harry’s group letter and was sitting in his usual meditation space by the base of the cherry tree. He looked up, mouth agape, before flipping the page around to point at a particular scribbled line.

“HOW in Merlin’s name did Severus end up becoming a TEACHER?!” Florian incredulously asked.

“He WHAT?!”

\-------

Back in the staff room at Hogwarts, one Severus Snape violently sneezed.

“Perhaps you’re coming down with something Severus,” Poppy Pomfrey murmured from beside him as Bathsheda Babbling and Sybil Trelawney continued to argue over the scheduling of their third year elective classes under calm mediation from Dumbledore, largely ignoring and being ignored in turn by the rest of the meeting.

“I think there’s a muggle superstition that you sneeze whenever someone talks about you behind your back,” Charity Burbage unhelpfully suggested, earning her a glare from the dour potions professor currently blowing his nose.

The relatively new muggle studies professor (she’d taken over from Quirinus Quirrell the previous year while he’d been on sabbatical), while reasonably competent and far less jumpy than her predecessor, had an irritating habit of regularly offering unsolicited muggle trivia to anyone within hearing range; much of which was either useless or downright incorrect.

Still, she was fairly tolerable… at least when compared to some of the odd characters whom had joined them around this table in the past few decades, most often in the cursed DADA position.

And speaking of the newly minted DADA Professor Quirrell…

The turbaned man sitting in between Aurora and Irma was looking slightly ill, an hour or so into the lengthy Sunday staff meeting and with no clear end in sight.

The poor man had come back from his sabbatical with a terrible stutter, highly strung nerves and amidst rumours he’d had a nasty encounter with a vampire or some other dark creature while he’d been gone. For all appearances it seemed the Defence Against the Dark Arts curse had struck him BEFORE he’d even formally taken up the position.

(And they’d all had such high hopes that the years’ worth of notice and sabbatical would have helped stave it off for once)

He’d stumbled his way through a fairly comprehensive report of his first week’s classes just before Bathsheda and Sybil had begun their row, but putting it frankly, he had been quite a trial to listen to. It was clear that the students he was teaching daily would likely have even greater difficulties deciphering what exactly he was trying to say.

Poor Quirinus. He probably wouldn’t last to the next year. If the clearly incoming nervous breakdown didn’t get him first, the school board undoubtedly would.

Which was doubly unfortunate, as Dumbledore and his advisors were clearly starting to run out of ideas to entice a new DADA professor to the school after approximately forty years of scandal, accidents and sheer bad luck.

Nowadays simply APPLYING for the position could put you on the DMLE’s permanent watch list if it didn’t manage to land you in St Mungo’s first.

(Even the Aurors were now declining to send temporary substitutes after that incident with Johnson’s disappearance in ‘84. The rumours about acromantulas breeding in the forbidden forest had only grown since then, despite Rubeus Hagrid’s numerous assurances there was nothing to truly fear in there)

“It remains a fact that Runes and Divination aren’t often subjects chosen together, Trelawney!” Bathsheda growled as she finally lost her patience, spitting out the other professor’s surname with unmistakable venom and drawing the rest of the staff room’s attention back to the rapidly deteriorating argument. “I don’t see why you feel the need to break up MY classes part-way through the year just because you’ve lost two potential students to scheduling difficulties!”

“The inner eye is a mysterious and rare gift,” Sybil countered absently, but with a similar hard venom belying her usual airy tone. “What if it is present in one of them and never given a proper chance to flourish in my class?”

Minerva, sitting about as far away as one could get around the table from the Divination professor, had to supress an incredulous snort.

“Now now Sybil, Bathsheda,” Dumbledore said calmly as the Runes professor seemed primed to leap across the table and strangle the Divination teacher. “In the end it is always the final decision of the student which class they take when there is a scheduling conflict. As I said at the end of last term: both Mr Gowdry and Miss Carrow chose to take Runes when informed of the scheduling difficulty, and they have not approached their heads of houses since for a course change,”

“Exactly!” Bathsheda huffed in agreement.

It was about the fourth time the headmaster had said some variation of this counter-argument since the row had begun, but as expected, Sybil immediately began to wail about ‘the inner eye’ and ‘lost prophecies’ and the rather circular quarrel continued, each party involved growing steadily more agitated as time went on.

Even ever the ever calm and reasonable Dumbledore’s twinkling eyes were beginning to twitch with supressed irritation.

Filius over in the corner covertly summoned a house elf to get the other teachers some more tea, coffee and shortbread.

They were likely going to be here a while.

(If only their proposal for time turner use by students taking extra subjects hadn’t been delayed by the Department of Mysteries for yet another sixteen months… For some, it seemed like the only way they might get Sybil’s inevitable yearly arguments about the elective scheduling to finally cease)

\-------

As the headmaster gradually wore Sybil Trelawney down into acquiescence over the existing third year class schedules, back in Azkaban Sirius Black was howling with laughter while both Raleigh Gibbon and Rabastan Lestrange struggled to take breaths between their own snickers.

“Ah, swimming across the black lake! I’d forgotten I’d told him that!” Sirius cackled. “I can only imagine the look on his face when Hagrid led them down to the boats!”

“You can practically hear him scolding you through the letter,” Raleigh wheezed, cheeks rosy red as he peered over Sirius’s shoulder at the man’s personal letter. “Imagine if he’d sent you a howler instead!”

Rabastan said nothing, as he was still trying to catch his breath through his chuckling at the whole situation.

Meanwhile, a short distance away under the cherry tree, Florian was still contemplating the idea of Severus Snape as a teacher and definitely NOT sulking.

(He was sulking. Just a little)

Even Sirius had managed to wrap his head around that particular news faster than poor Florian had. Just… little Severus, the boy he’d taught the foundations of occlumency to back when he was in fifth year and had then gone on to absolutely thrash Florian in learning legilimency later in life… that Severus was now teaching potions of all things at Hogwarts?

But the man HATED children!

“Florian, you’re thinking too hard,” Augustus said softly from beside him, giving him a gentle elbow in the ribs. “It’s likely he’s stuck there on Dumbledore’s orders. He was in an even more precarious situation than most of us were at the end of the war. One doesn’t claim to be a double agent and come out of it without a lot of enemies… I dread to think what might become of him should our lord return and hear of his claims,”

“But he HATES children!” Florian exclaimed, not for the first time.

“So you’ve said,” Phineas remarked with a pointed roll of his eyes, attempting (and due to the continued chatter surrounding him, failing miserably) to take a nap on Florian’s other side against the trunk of the tree. “We all hate dementors and we still ended up here, didn’t we?”

Bellatrix and Rodolphus had wandered off back up to cell 09 a while back to apparently digest what they’d just read and to put away the spoils of the earlier house bet.

(Nobody would dare to go bother them. They’d all learnt that lesson early on once the married couple had reconciled a number of years before, and accidentally walking in on them was something most of the tower inhabitants had done at least once. That had been an awkward talk to give to poor Harry… and admittedly a task they’d all abandoned to his godfather to handle)

The whole group-addressed letter had been commandeered by Edward, Antonin and Donnell for further rereading, all of them sitting at the base of the stairs now that the initial perusal of the text had been completed to the group’s content.

Edward in particular was nodding to himself with a smile while rereading Harry’s brief recounting of his first trip to Gringotts, and Donnell was puffed up proudly over Harry’s description of his first potions lesson.

…

…Antonin Dolohov however, was frowning at the very last page of Harry’s letter with a concerned expression, getting the feeling he was missing something very important…

_‘…and my scar’s only hurt once since leaving Azkaban and Halloween isn’t anywhere close at all! I’d say that’s a good sign, wouldn’t you?_

_Some of the professors were looking at me strangely when it happened, including the defence teacher, so I guess maybe it had something to do with that curse Augustus told me about? It’s the only thing even close to the usual trigger that I could deduce. Anyway, I’m not really sure, as I was pretty tired at the time and not paying much attention._

_Give my love to the snakes please! It doesn’t matter if you say it in English. They’ll understand your tone I’m sure, if not the words._

_I look forward to reading your replies, but I have so much homework on my hands that it might take me a while to get through them!_

_Love you all,_

_Harry’_

Every letter that went in or out of Azkaban was read through by the human guards and censored if necessary, so of course Harry hadn’t written down all the details but…

Antonin sighed heavily, rubbing his eyes.

Debating internally, the Death Eater contemplated the scene before him, Sirius and the prankster goons laughing happily, the intellectuals sitting by the tree locked in discussion over Severus’s merits (or lack thereof) as a professor, everyone in various stages of contentment having had their dose of Harry contact for the month.

…

And so he decided to keep his concerns to himself for now, deciding it probably wasn’t a big deal and not wishing to worry the others. Harry would have written in more detail if it was, censors or not.

But the fact remained… the only time Harry’s scar had ever hurt before was…

Antonin squeezed his eyes shut as an involuntary shudder ran through him at the very thought, trying not to look at the ever present forms of the dementors silently guarding them, lest it bring back unwanted memories of Halloween nights in previous years.

Harry was safe at Hogwarts, Antonin reminded himself firmly as he folded the last page of the letter back up. Or at the very least, he was far safer there than he had ever been in here.

\-------

The staff meeting, after a gruelling three hours of discussion, argument, compromise and various reports, was finally, FINALLY wrapping up for the day, allowing for a precious few hours of free time before the sun went down and they had to prepare for Monday morning’s upcoming lessons.

Severus Snape, of course, was the first professor out the door, followed closely by Sybil Trelawney and Argus Filch, the trio being well known as the most unsociable of the staff at Hogwarts… albeit for very different reasons.

Albus Dumbledore, again as expected, was the one who lingered behind for the longest, patiently waiting for any last minute or forgotten concerns to be brought up before he retired to his tower for the afternoon.

(Of course, dearly departed Binns hadn’t even been present in the first place. The ghost never attended staff meetings, forcing everyone else to work around HIS long dead schedule time and again. Bloody benign undead protection laws…)

And somewhere in the middle of the pack gradually trickling out of the staff room, unexceptionable and all but invisible, was Quirinus Quirrell.

The turbaned professor almost immediately broke off from his fellows with a stuttered excuse about paperwork and hastily retreated to his rooms above the DADA classroom.

It was there, with the windows and doors shut, locked and warded for good measure, that he tentatively removed his turban and allowed the face on the back of his head some degree of sensory independence.

Lord Voldemort, while he was perfectly capable of piggybacking off of Quirrell’s own eyes and ears, still preferred not having to take such measures when there were no witnesses about.

“Being in the headmaster’s presence for such an extended length of time makes me sick,” the face hissed in frustration the instant the last strip of turban was removed from its mouth, making Quirrell jump in alarm. “To be so close… and to say absolutely nothing…! It frustrates me to no end,”

“D-do you need a-anything my lord?” Quirrell nervously asked, the stammer in his voice for once not at all faked.

(He only ever seemed to genuinely stutter while talking to his Lord these days… a fact that irritated said Lord to no end)

“I will survive,” Voldemort flatly replied, much to his host’s obvious relief.

Quirrell moved to the small writing desk next to the curtained window and sat down sideways in his chair, allowing both faces on his head a clear view of the multitude of papers stacked upon it.

A great deal of it was, in fact, the typical paperwork of a teacher new to the DADA position. Various waivers, class plans, scheduling rosters for night patrols etc… But there were also a number of papers disguised by the clutter that held some very different information.

An odd map of some underground tunnels only a goblin would recognise at a glance… A series of notes on the movements of one Nicholas Flamel… Messages from an unscrupulous troll ‘tamer’ from Wales that had been easily bribed…

“When should I approach Severus Snape my lord?” Quirrell inquired, hand ghosting over a particular paper that contained the Slytherin Head of House’s patrol schedule for the next week. “There will be s-several opportunities where our paths cross and we are sure not to be overheard in the night on Wednesday and Friday,”

…

In one world, Lord Voldemort approves of this plan.

In one world, Quirrell approaches the double agent about a certain third floor corridor in the dead of night, and unknowing of his current loyalties, unduly raises the suspicions of both Severus and the Headmaster.

…

But in this one, for no readily apparent reason, the face on the back of the DADA professor’s head… hesitates for a moment, a multitude of thoughts twisted with warped ideas of loyalty, vengeance and power gradually refocusing into something… clearer.

(For a split second, a flash of silver and green crosses his vision… but like the many others like it over this past week, he pays it no real mind)

“I am… unsure of the potion master’s true loyalties,” Voldemort instead said contemplatively. “I will not further risk your position with him unless we can be certain,”

“Yes Master,” Quirrell agreed in clearly apparent relief.

(Somewhere down in the dungeons, Professor Snape sneezed again over a particularly delicate brew, growing more agitated by the second)

(If Professor Burbage was right, he thought, there were some dunderheads out there right now that he’d dearly like to foist a detention on)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all who left kudos and comments on the last chapter!
> 
> Harry's unknowing impersonation of you-know-who will come up again in the future! (And yes, Bellatrix knew exactly what she was doing when she taught him. Sneaky witch :) Nobody else wanted to ruin little Harry's innocence by telling him the truth)  
> Oh well, at least it's effective- even on people who weren't around to witness the original inspiration! Now I wonder why that might be...
> 
> Next time: A (brief?) summary of the first two (blissfully conflict free?) months of school... or, the birth of the Quiet Ones


	11. The Birth of the Quiet Ones

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What goes on during the first two months of school once everyone's settled in?  
> Friendships grow, routine establishes itself, house 'secrets' are shared and Harry's little group is finally given a name...

The first two months of school passed by in a series of utterly mundane events that none the less brought Harry great joy.

For once in his life, he was free to explore as much as his heart desired (unlike how he’d been limited by nosy visitors in St Mungo’s and by space in the northern tower), he could read and read and read as often as he wished (which was lucky, considering that he had his muggle fiction, his new magical texts, the bounty of the Ravenclaw library AND the massive public school library to peruse and choose from now) and he had a close knit group of friends his own age in which to share it all.

Indeed, Harry, Neville, Sophie and Theo had become quite the tight little group since they’d caught up with each other at the end of that first week.

They explored (and got hopelessly lost) together in the winding halls and secret passageways at Neville’s shy behest, sat together at meals (taking turns at each of the house tables) much to Sophie’s private delight, sequestered themselves together during their study time (in what quickly became THEIR private nook in the library) at Theo’s blunt insistence-

(-Madam Pince may or may not have developed a soft spot for the party of four first years who alone out of all their school mates seemed capable of respecting the peace and quiet of her domain-)

-and perhaps most importantly, never again did any of them awkwardly sit in classes all alone, house divides be damned!

It quickly became known amongst their year mates that it was futile to try to keep the four apart during lessons. Harry now regularly sat next to Theo in Charms, Herbology and Defence Against the Dark Arts. He would always partner with Neville in Transfiguration, Astronomy and History of Magic. And of course, he now permanently worked at the same bench as Sophie during Potions, the only class Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff shared besides flying lessons.

And oh, flying lessons were brilliant!

It was tradition at Hogwarts that after the first week of term was safely over and done, formal instruction on how to handle an enchanted broom would begin for the newest students.

Madam Hooch, a part time flying instructor and quidditch referee that lived in Hogsmeade, came up to the castle twice a week (good weather permitting) to teach the first years proper broom maintenance and flying technique, and these lessons quickly became Harry’s favourite part of the class schedule.

Uncle Padfoot had often told him about how his father had practically lived on a broom from second year onwards, but he’d never managed to get across just how… marvellous the act of being up in the air actually was.

And Sophie clearly agreed, because she quickly became almost as obsessed with flying as she was with herpetology.

The two quickly rose to the top of the combined Hufflepuff-Ravenclaw flying class despite their lack of pre-Hogwarts experience with brooms, and became quite enamoured with the beater and keeper quidditch drills in particular after discovering how stress relieving it was to batter the squishy practice quaffle around.

(The seeker drills however, in which Madam Hooch threw shiny little balls the size of a walnut for the students to catch, quickly became the least favourite part of Harry’s lessons after he was smashed into by an overenthusiastic classmate, Oliver Rivers (?) he thought, and nearly knocked off his broom while trying to catch one on his first try. He stuck to the other exercises after that)

Neville and Theo, on the other hand, were slightly less enthusiastic about flying after an incident in the Gryffindor-Slytherin’s first lesson in which Neville broke his wrist, Theo had to covertly pickpocket Neville’s fallen remembrall off of a boasting Malfoy and Ron Weasley had finally blown up at Hermione Granger for asking him too many questions, sending the girl running off in tears and earning their whole remaining class detentions after nobody could tell the returning Madam Hooch where she’d gone.

(“She was crying in one of the girl’s bathrooms for the rest of the day I heard. Malfoy wouldn’t shut up about it,”

“Honestly I don’t blame Ron for losing his temper eventually… Even back at the orientation to Diagon Alley she was a bit… But even so! He could have handled it a bit better,”

“What happened after that? She seemed okay in class yesterday,”

“Lavender went looking for her after dinner I think. I’m not sure what happened, but by the time I was out of the hospital wing they were both sitting together at breakfast,”

“…Isn’t Lavender Brown the one you said tried to throw Granger’s books down their dormitory stairs in our first week Neville?”

“…,”

“…,”

“…I guess the shared experience made them friends somehow…?”)

\-------

As the weeks flew by and their lessons grew more interesting, one by one each of the Ravenclaw first years were called out of classes to speak individually with their head of house- who turned out to be Professor Flitwick.

It had been a little surprising for Harry, to be called out of DADA for tea and biscuits with the small wizard in order to talk over his interests-

(-flying and reading-)

-his dislikes-

(-Professor Binns’ ‘teaching’ style and being bothered with personal questions by overzealous classmates-)

-his strengths-

(-potions safety, most magical theory and again, flying-)

-and his weaknesses.

(Riddles. Of course, Harry’s practical spellcasting was also a little poor compared to his level of theory knowledge… but his sheer hopelessness at riddles far outstripped that as his worst weakness)

Professor Flitwick was kind and understanding, offering tips for studying, help with practical practice (and even recommending a book of riddles that apparently lived amidst his common room shelves), and all round presenting himself as a friendly ear for any concerns or ideas any of his students may have.

It had been… actually kind of fun, and not as awkward as Harry had expected talking to a teacher one-on-one would be. Thankfully, Professor Flitwick seemed to have finally gotten over his slight star-struck-ness around Harry by that point, or else the meeting could have turned out utterly torturous instead.

And speaking of the Ravenclaw first year meetings… well, it turned out that having friends in all three other Hogwarts houses gave a unique perspective on the practical differences between how each was managed.

(“…so I think that the rest of the first year meetings will be wrapping up by the end of the week, judging by how many of us are left alphabetically,”

“Professor Flitwick really takes the time to do all of that? I don’t think McGonagall has any one on one meetings with students until OWL year,”

“…If there’s a one on one meeting with Snape in my house, usually it means something’s horribly wrong…,”

“Wait, are you guys saying that none of you had a full year group meeting with your head of house?”

“No…?”

“…no?”

“I saw Snape take some of us aside on the first night, but seeing as they were the new… non-pureblood… students, I assumed it was related to that,”

“Er, sorry, maybe it’s just a Hufflepuff thing…,”

“…hmm, I wonder…,”)

The ensuing conversations had led to a whole other series of fascinating revelations about the differences in how each school house was internally run.

According to Neville, besides having no strict ‘bedtime’ curfew so long as you were at least in the common room or dorms, Gryffindor students also seemingly had the MOST diligent house elves in Hogwarts assigned to their tower.  The fires were always lit, apparently never needing tending to by older students like they often were in the other common rooms, and the laundry hampers went practically unused as dirty clothes simply vanished wherever they were dropped.

On top of that, the usually strict rule of allowed pets seemed to be a bit more of a… guideline in Gryffindor house. For example, one of Neville’s roommates said that his brother had kept a rat without any problems, a current third year student was rumoured to have a giant tarantula, and there was even one seventh year whom boasted about keeping a goat in his dorm for its milk!

As for Slytherin, while Theo was quick to bemoan the strict etiquette rules enforced by their head of house (Professor Snape, and somehow that wasn’t a surprise) and the sheer infuriating politics of their social dynamics, it turned out that they didn’t have to share large year/gender combined dorms.

Instead they had cosy rooms of two or three (Theo shared with Blaise Zabini, who apparently still chased him around with a comb some mornings), or in the case of prefects and others with special responsibilities, luxurious single rooms. The Slytherins even had deep wardrobes to unpack their belongings into rather than needing to live out of their trunks year-round, and their bathrooms had actual BATHS alongside the usual stall-showers!

They’d all been very envious of Theo for that- or at least until Sophie had revealed that the ‘hobbit-hole-like’ (as she’d wistfully described it, much to all but Harry’s confusion) Hufflepuff common room had its own doorway to the school kitchens… and thus HER house had the coveted privilege of direct access to the school’s combined population of doting house elves.

However, Hufflepuff students also had to grapple with the much less coveted ‘Hufflepuff Mentorship Program’, which Sophie had described as having several dozen overprotective elder siblings that could as easily be annoyances as they were aid. Being able to freely make requests of the house elves sometimes wasn’t quite worth the trade-off of being hounded about your homework, your social life and your feelings near 24/7 by zealous older housemates.

It was rather fascinating for Harry to see some of the practical benefits and disadvantages of being sorted into each house… though in the end, Harry decided that despite the mandatory wake up alarm every morning, the enforced curfew, no kitchen access, the shared dorms and the constant bloody riddles-

( _-‘Brothers and sisters I have none, yet this man’s father is my father’s son. Who I am to this man?’ ‘…his door knocker…?’ ‘…sigh…,’-_ )

-with a bit of perspective he found he was perfectly happy with the bounties of the Ravenclaw private library and his hands-on head of house.

Though he still did wonder just what kind of magic the house elves used to handle the apparent disaster zone (according to Neville) of the Gryffindor dorms. Perhaps he could coerce Sophie into getting one of them to speak to him someday.

\-------

Outside of classes, meals and their general exploration of the ever changing castle-

(-it really wasn’t just the visibly moving staircases and now Harry had proof! The DADA classroom used to be on the fourth floor, but by week three of the term it had mysteriously migrated to the fifth-)

-the four of them could most often be found in the library, either reading together in companionable silence or collectively completing the copious amounts of homework they were assigned every week.

And as it turned out, they had quite a diverse set of skills between them when it came to studying and revising.

Harry’s strengths and weaknesses were fairly rounded due to his makeshift education in Azkaban. He tended more towards knowing random trivia over a wide variety of topics than any speciality in a particular subject, as his haphazard approach to finding new reading material (which was honestly just picking whichever book had the most interesting title/picture/cover summary at the time) didn’t lend itself towards any real focused interests like Sophie’s predilection for herpetology or Neville’s particular fondness for plants.

Nevertheless, Harry shared all he could about the topics he did know well. He had quite the little seminar about potions safety with the group once it came out that Neville had managed to melt no less than three cauldrons a month into the term (Harry felt faint just at the thought of so many pewter fumes…), and it soon turned out he was the only one of them (perhaps even out of the whole first year group as a whole) that could decipher any real meaning from Professor Quirrell’s stammering DADA lectures and frankly hard-to-read handwriting on the chalkboard.

(“Wait, he said banshee? I thought he said something about bats! I thought he was making some kind of reference to vampires or- or- something!”

“So the Ravenclaw-Slytherin class is already covering creatures? Has he mentioned anything about magical reptiles yet?”

“Not really, I think dark creatures in general are more the third year curriculum from what I’ve read. Technically he was only talking about banshees that time to give an example of the effectiveness of the wand-lighting charm against the undead,”

“Hang on, he’s actually covering spells with you guys? He’s only gone into theory with our class so far… no wonder Malfoy already knows so many jinxes,”

“…,”

“…,”

“…,”

“…,”

“…do you need me to slip something venomous into his dorm room Neville?”

“If you lend me Trevor for a couple of months I can help with the venom part! I’d need to get a fresh hens egg off the groundskeeper though, and the books all say we’d need Harry’s help to control it once its hatched…,”

“Sophie… do I even want to know?”

“Ah-! M-maybe just help me learn some good counters? Please? He’s really not worth getting in trouble over,”

“*sigh*…if that’s what you want. But I’ll leave that option on the table for the future,”)

Neville, of course, breezed through anything to do with Herbology or even mundane plants, becoming their study group’s go to tutor for anything particularly obscure that Professor Sprout mentioned. Additionally, Neville had possibly an even better understanding of Transfiguration theory than Harry did… though he admitted it probably wouldn’t have been at all helpful in practice were he still stuck with his father’s uncooperative old wand.

(“I’ve been meaning to ask, but where did you get that holster from Neville? I never saw anything like it in Diagon Alley,”

“Oh this? It belonged to my dad when he was in the auror force. Gran insisted I take it with me if I wasn’t taking his wand. It’s actually quite useful,”

“Hmm… wand holsters aren’t really very popular these days. Something about them going out of fashion by the end of the last war. I know that seeing someone openly wearing a duelling holster can make my fath- some people very tense these days,”

“But it does look useful for self-defence. I mean, if I’m in a hurry digging my wand out of my pockets in my muggle clothing is hard enough, let alone robes. And simply carrying it around in a schoolbag would leave it open to being separated from you…,”

“Well… I don’t think I could get leather here, but I might be able to make something similar with cloth? Or a wand ‘pocket’ up a robe sleeve or something?”

“You can sew Harry? Gran never let me learn how! She always told me needlework was a girl’s skill,”

“…Neville, no offence, but your Grandmother is pretty well known for being a little… well… overly traditional. And that’s in MY father’s social circle,”

“I’M a girl, and I CAN’T sew! So there!”

“*Sigh* Look, male or female, learning to stitch and patch clothing is ALWAYS a useful skill. That’s what I was taught, at least. And besides, sewing needles can make for pretty good improvised weapons in a pinch,”

“Er…you know, I was about to ask who taught you, but on second thoughts maybe it’s better if I never find out,”

“…yes, considering the list of potential candidates, probably for the best,”)

Sophie was uncontestably the best of them at Charms, at least in practice, and she seemingly had the practical touch with Potions that the rest of them lacked once she’d gotten Harry’s safety instructions drummed into her head. And of course, her general obsession with any and all reptiles and amphibians (including magical varieties now she knew of their existence) lent itself greatly to any mention of them in DADA homework, related Potions ingredients and any snippet of history with dragons or other great scaly creatures involved.

(“Harry… I have a bit of a weird question… do you know if parseltongue is purely an inheritable trait, or is it possible for the language to be taught?”

“…,”

“…ahem, Sophie, as you are muggleborn, you may not be aware, but the language of snakes or ‘parseltongue’ is often considered linked to the dark-,”

“Well, I’ve never actually tried to teach anyone before- it’s always just come naturally to me. But I can try if you’d like?”

“Really?! I mean, if you could try then I’d really appreciate it… please…,”

“…Theo? You okay?”

“-arts, wait hang on what do you mean teach-,”

“I don’t see why not. I guess the first thing to mention is that sometimes it’s difficult to tell English and parseltongue apart if you’re already inclined to it. For example, _this is what ‘hello’ sounds like_ ,”

“Oh, er… I’m sorry, but that just sounded like hissing to me,”

“Um, Harry? Theo’s starting to freak out…,”

“-and now he’s hissing, of course he’s hissing, Harry Potter is a parselmouth, of course he is, oh Merlin what is my life-, ”

“…ah… that’s right, you weren’t there when we discussed this on the train, were you Theo?”)

And as for Theo… well, he practically became their History of Magic teacher in lieu of their ghostly professor’s outdated and often repetitive sermons. He was in fact a bit of a magical history buff, you could say, and was prone to going off on long (but fun) rants about the inaccuracies their textbooks deliberately printed about the witch hunts if prodded.

(For example, don’t mention Wendelin the Weird within Theo’s earshot if you don’t have at least thirty minutes to spare. Just don’t)

In addition to that, as his father had also allowed him wand access probably a bit earlier than was considered legal, Theo was also the most practiced of them all with actually casting spells and was invaluable for sharing tips the professors didn’t always reveal.

(“So it’s a bit more of a swish and flick and poke, not just a swish and flick,”

“Oh I see! _Wingardium Leviosa_!”

“Hey! I was reading that!”

“Well, at least Professor Flitwick will be happy when we get to the practical demonstration in class…,”)

The only true gap in talent they had was in Astronomy… but somehow they were always able to muddle through their moon phase calculations, solstice and equinox dates and varying star related magical phenomena research if they worked together. If not as enthusiastically as they did with their favourite subjects of course.

So other than the occasional star chart they had to fill out, the foursome’s classwork as a whole quickly became known by the professors as some of the best in the school. And while they might not be the top students of their year-

(-that honour was currently held by the whirlwind of knowledge Hermione Granger, closely followed by the proud, pompous Draco Malfoy, whom apparently did have a brain somewhere in his skull… seemingly just not one that could behave like a decent human being-)

-they were well aware that if they kept up their current study strategy, by the time exams came around they would have nothing to worry about.

(It wasn’t necessarily that any of them were stupider that usual when working on their own… but working together to cover each other’s weak points did wonders for both their confidence and their grades)

\-------

At some point in time during those first two months, while the odd multi-housed group trod all over any kind of formal house separation outside of the common rooms, rose close to the top in their year grades-wise and generally rebuffed any kind of unwanted attention directed their way-

(-often aided by Harry’s particular Aunt Bella certified tactic to ‘scare off overly-interested purebloods’, which Sophie in particular had been fascinated by… and which both Theo and Neville took great pains to ignore-)

-inevitably, rumours started to go about.

Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived-through-nine-years-of-Azkaban, had remained a mystery all this time to the student body, either skilfully avoiding, scaring away or completely ignoring any and all intrusive questioners asking about his life prior to Hogwarts. The general consensus was that he either didn’t want to talk about it, or simply didn’t care enough to spread the information about.

Thus nobody, least of all the rumour-mongers and gossip hounds (despite their best efforts to the contrary), knew ANYTHING concrete about Harry’s life in Azkaban… not even his closest friends.

(Neville was smarter to know than to ask obsessively about such a topic, taking the little snippets he got here and there with grace as he knew it may be all Harry would ever be comfortable with.

Theo, considering his particular family background and especially after what their group started to call the ‘parselmouth reveal’, knew better than to ask questions he may not want the answers to.

And Sophie, consummate muggleborn and with little frame of reference to fully understand the connotations of ‘nine years in Azkaban’, honestly didn’t care enough about it to even consider making her friend uncomfortable)

Of course, mystery begat curiosity, curiosity begat speculation, and eventually there was a number of increasingly odd theories going about not only Harry… but by extension, all four of the so-called ‘Quiet Ones’.

(‘I hear he’s training to become the next Dark Lord, and they’re the first of his inner circle…’ ‘Maybe he’s slowly turning into a dementor, and they’re trying to find a way to save him…!’ ‘I bet they’ve got some secret quest to complete from the headmaster, maybe something to do with the forbidden area on the third floor…’ ‘They’re probably all under compulsions never to speak to anyone but each other… why else wouldn’t they want to talk to me?’)

And though none of them really had the inclination (nor really patience) to listen to some of the frankly absurd rumours about themselves-

(-excepting perhaps that entertaining one started by the Weasley Twins that the four of them were actually in fact reincarnations of the four Hogwarts founders, and Harry had secretly become a dedicated crossdresser in order to fit Rowena Ravenclaw’s role ‘once the time came’-)

-the name that was assigned to them by the student body actually had a kind of appeal.

The Quiet Ones.

Well… It was true.

(In fact, Madam Pince eventually ended up placing a placard, assisted by a permanent sticking charm, on the group’s chosen library table stating just that.

‘Quiet Ones at work. Do not disturb’

Harry liked it)

\-------

(“A… troll, Quirrell?”

“Yes my lord, it will distract all of teachers capable of defensive spellcasting, and will confine all of the students either to the great hall or their house-,”

“Stop. Remind me Quirrell, what was it you… volunteered to Dumbledore as a piece in the gauntlet for the Philosopher’s stone?”

“A troll, Mast- Oh,”

“‘Oh’ indeed, Quirrell… Do you not think Dumbledore might find a troll invasion on Halloween a… tad suspicious, considering this?”

“O-of course Master. I will think of something else,”

“See to it that you do… If nothing else, we must have at least scouted the first part of the gauntlet by November or my… plans will have to change,”

“…well, how about…?”)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all again for so many kudos and comments!  
> I'm glad you guys liked the Azkaban inmates POV- rest assured we'll be seeing some more of them soon! They've become far too involved with Harry to end up entirely on the sidelines of his story... even if they are currently stuck in a tower on a rock somewhere in the North Sea. His influence doesn't fade so easily... (and beyond saying that, too many spoilers! :) But I can confirm that Harry's strange 'immunity' to dementors will be explained before the end of his first year)  
> The answer to the riddle in this chapter was 'this man' was the door knocker's son ('this man's father (me) is my father's (grandfather's) son'), though poor Harry can't get beyond the fact that magical door knockers technically can't reproduce...
> 
> Some of you may have noticed a number has replaced the question mark in the chapter count. This is because I've finally finished the first installment of this fic! (Yay!)  
> I still need to edit/nitpick/agonise over each chapter before I post it, but from now on I'll be posting once a week instead of every two weeks- although I might not be able to consistently post on a monday like I've been doing so far. Either way, enjoy!  
> Edit: Thank you to angelbroker for pointing out the slipup with Pettigrew, it has been fixed :) As for the conversations in parentheses I try to leave 'hints' for whoever is speaking, and each speaker takes a turn in order (usually out of four, and in the last case, two) Hope this is helpful!
> 
> Next time: Halloween... or, there might be no troll this time, but somehow things still manage to go pear shaped for Harry


	12. Halloween

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day of Halloween has arrived, with copious amounts of pumpkin and candy just around the corner!
> 
> Unfortunately, that isn't what Harry usually associates with this particular day...

Before Harry knew it, two whole months of school had flown by and Halloween had crept up on him like a murderous dementor.

…

Bad simile. Bad.

And the morning of the 31st of October had started out so very well too.

He’d awoken before the house-wide alarm had gone off and had a very relaxing shower in the intervening time without any interruption from his noisy housemates.

Then, he’d had some time to finally finish off the Return of the King at long last-

(-he’d been recently side-tracked by ‘The Shadow over Innsmouth’ in his muggle reading, wondering uneasily if some of Lovecraft’s Deep Ones might have been in residence around Azkaban, and had quite nearly forgotten that he hadn’t finished The Lord of the Rings yet in the process-)

-and had been midway through the book’s numerous appendices when the rumbling of his stomach had finally encouraged him down to breakfast.

The delicious smell of roasting pumpkin wafting through the halls made him curious about what would be awaiting them on the tables. So he was mildly surprised to be met with no pumpkin flavoured foods at all when he sat down beside Sophie and Theo. (As per usual, Neville ‘late-rising Gryff’ Longbottom would be the last to join them)

In fact, it looked like it was a hearty full English breakfast day that morning. The house elves usually laid out at least one each week, usually on Mondays or Fridays. A vast array of sausages, bacon, fried mushrooms, black pudding, baked beans, hash browns, grilled tomatoes and eggs in every possible style imaginable were all set out neatly on separate heated trays for students to pick and choose at their fancy.

“I thought I smelt pumpkin on my way here today…,” Harry murmured with a frown, making himself a ‘sandwich’ out of a two flat, crispy hash browns and a single grilled tomato half.

“It’s probably for the feast tonight,” Theo said with a shrug, a half-eaten slice of white toast slathered in something chocolaty in hand. “My father always said the house elves try to have at least one whole roast pumpkin per table for display on Halloween, not to mention all of the other pumpkin dishes they’ll have out. I wouldn’t be surprised if it takes them all day to prepare,”

Unnoticed by his still food distracted friend, Harry suddenly went rigid in his seat. Sophie however, sitting across from him, was a little more observant.

“Harry? Are you okay?” she asked worriedly, setting down her cup of tea.

“I… wasn’t aware of the date today,” Harry replied distractedly, placing his untouched potato/tomato breakfast back down onto his plate, no longer hungry.

( _-cold stone, cold wind, cold water, cold-_ )

Sophie just seemed confused by his explanation, but Theo’s eyes lit up in sudden understanding.

“Would you like to go to the hospital wing?” he asked him quietly, pulling Harry out of his thoughts. “I’m sure Madam Pomphrey can give you a pass out of classes for the day,”

As Theo talked, a look of realisation also crossed Sophie’s face, but she politely didn’t say anything. Harry was grateful for that. It would make things a lot easier if his friends just assumed his sudden nerves about Halloween were related to the anniversary of the defeat of the Dark Lord… to the death of his parents.

(In reality, it was so much worse)

“Thank you for the suggestion Theo, but I think I can push through,” Harry answered him with a forced smile. “I don’t really want any special treatment…,”

“Of all the people in this school, I think you’d be the most entitled to it. Especially on a day like today,” Theo fired back with a raised eyebrow.

“I’ll be fine,” Harry repeated, picking up his hash browns and deliberately taking a bite. The delightfully salty tomato and potato combination didn’t taste as good as it usually did, but he forced it down anyway. He couldn’t afford to skip meals, or the potion that had to be taken with them for that matter.

“…let us know if you don’t feel well later on though, ‘kay?” Sophie quietly requested, her eyes shining with concern.

Harry managed to smile a bit more genuinely this time.

“I will,” he confirmed.

It looked like Theo was going to persist in trying to convince him to get a pass out of classes for the day, but at that moment a sleepy eyed Neville joined them at the table, usual braids immaculate despite his tunic being on backwards, and the Slytherin’s attention was drawn to fixing his other friend’s uniform.

Harry gulped down the rest of his even smaller than usual breakfast and attempted to quietly meditate a little before they had to go to their first class. He forced up his (admittedly more fragile feeling than usual) occlumency shields and desperately hoped they would last intact-

(-keep the memories at bay-)

-until Halloween was over, and the blessedly normal 1st of November came to his rescue.

( _-cold, freezing cold, BURNING cold-_ )

Hogwarts, Harry reminded himself as the chatter of other students became louder and louder in his ears. I’m at Hogwarts. Hogwarts.

\-------

Despite his best efforts at actively enforcing his occlumency, Harry was distracted and jittery all through his classes that day.

(It was a delightfully balmy day outside for late October, but every gust of chilled wind through a door or window made Harry shudder and jump in alarm)

He was sure that Professor Snape had noticed him visibly trying (and for the most part, failing) to all but occlude his emotions null during potions in the morning, but his nerves were so tightly strung he barely even cared.

He’d actually tripped over Mrs Norris on his way up to History of Magic, earning a fierce scolding from Filch and he would have been late if it weren’t for a concerned Neville, whom had come looking for him and rescued him from the caretaker’s ire just before the bell.

Lunch had been even trickier for Harry to power through than breakfast had been, despite the sun shining rosy and high above him through the bewitched ceiling and the otherwise delicious spread of approximately two thousand variations of sandwich the house elves had set out for the meal.

(Had he mentioned the house elves tended to go a little overboard? Because they did. If he weren’t feeling so… off, Harry would have been both looking forward to and slightly apprehensive of seeing the undoubtedly extravagant Halloween feast that night)

The first class of the afternoon was DADA, in which Professor Quirrell would be finally demonstrating some simple jinxes and defensive charms… after having putting the practical demonstration off in favour of the theory behind them for the last three weeks.

(Honestly, was the thought of twenty or so first years all learning the tickling charm such a terrible thought? …actually, don’t answer that. Maybe the professor had a point)

At least in this class the professor’s own nerves were so visibly bad that even Theo didn’t pay quite as much attention to Harry’s continually growing anxiety.

“…n-now class, the incantation f-for this c-ch-ch-charm is ric-rictusempra,” Professor Quirrell somehow managed to get out, looking rather faint at the prospect of the crowd of eleven and twelve year olds before him learning such a spell. “The w-wand mo-movement is thus,”

The turbaned professor waved his wand in an intricate looking pattern far too fast for Harry’s eyes to follow, and he started to feel the beginning of a headache creeping up on him. Sitting beside him, Theo half-heartedly tried to follow the movement with his own wand, before letting his head drop onto the table in defeat with a resounding, dull ‘thunk’.

Defence against the Dark Arts (or ‘da da’, or simply ‘defence’ as many students shortened it to) was an interesting subject in theory… but it had remarkably poor luck with keeping regular and competent professors, at least according to the older students.

Poor luck… or a curse perhaps, they’d murmured excitedly amongst themselves as they’d told the little Ravenclaw firsties the many stories of weird, awful and downright dangerous DADA professors they’d had over the course of their education, and the even more varied ways they’d inevitably lost the position as the year ended.

Of course, Harry thought with a grimace, he probably knew a bit more about the fabled curse than even his older housemates did…

_-‘There’s a curse on the position of defence at Hogwarts school,’ Augustus Rookwood had once causally informed him. ‘No teacher for that subject ever lasts longer than a year before they’re removed from the position… one way or another. The Dark Lord placed the curse himself, and not a single person in the decades since has managed to counter it,’_

_The ex-unspeakable had then shrugged._

_‘Or at least, not before I was sent here,’ he said with a disarming smile. ‘The Ministry had a team of unspeakables looking into it during the war, but seeing as I was assigned as part of that team… well, ‘we’ never found anything conclusive. Officially, it’s all just bad luck,’_

_And then the man had gone right back to going over the theory behind some minor jinxes and curses just as he’d been doing before slipping that odd bit of information into the lesson he was giving ten year old Harry on basic defence._

_…a few months after, and four strangers had come to the tower to finally take him away. He hadn’t really thought on it since-_

A chorus of irritated groans from his classmates brought Harry back to the here and now, where Professor Quirrell was attempting to demonstrate the wand movement again… and again, far too quickly for even the most diligent eye to follow. Harry wondered if the stuttering professor was aware there was a baleful curse bearing down on him, that he was highly unlikely to last all the way through to next September.

If he did, it would certainly explain the general aura of terror the man had about him whenever confronted with his own subject.

“Maybe you could draw a diagram of the movement on the board?” a Ravenclaw student (Er- Terry Boot, Harry thought?) piped up from the table behind Harry and Theo, making a visible blush of embarrassment spread up on the professor’s face.

“Ah! Ah, y-yes… that m-might help…,” Professor Quirrell said reluctantly, side-eyeing the blackboard already covered with a number of pre-written instructions that had been there before class had even started.

Professor Quirrell, besides his stutter, his general nerves and his terror of dark creatures, was also well known for hardly ever turning his back on a classroom, having been rumoured to have been badly hexed in the back by a vindictive fourth year just before he’d dropped out of the Muggle Studies professorship to take a sabbatical.

Or charged by a vicious kelpie while his back was turned to the Black Lake during the summer while moving into his new quarters.

Or having turned his back in error to Professor Snape at the start of the school year and was faced with the… consequences. (This theory in particular was quite popular)

A few Slytherin students (cough*Malfoy*cough) were starting to snicker at the poor professor’s obvious reluctance, and Harry felt his headache worsen.

He clenched his teeth behind pursed lips and tried to ignore it.

It was just because he didn’t drink much at lunch. Because he was having trouble with deciphering Professor Quirrell’s stutter. Because of the poor lighting in the classroom.

There were any number of reasons that-

Professor Quirrell turned around to quickly slash a quick wand movement diagram in chalk on the board… and Harry stopped breathing as the scar on his forehead exploded in pain.

Like shattering glass, what little was left of his nerves-thinned occlumency shields gave way as complete, irrational panic spread like wildfire through his mind.

_A **nd**_ the **me _mori_** es con _sum **ed him.**_

\-------

_The winds were cold._

_The stones were cold._

_The water drip, drip, drip, drip, dripping from the centre of the sagging stone roof-down to the ground-flowing into the toilet pit in the corner- was cold._

_Harry, curled up in the corner in terror while a massive black dog snapped and snarled at the door, was cold, with no blanket and no Uncle Padfoot to warm him._

_His tears, drip, drip, drip, drip, dripping down his cheeks were cold, as the familiar screams he had once fallen asleep to every night echoed in his waking ears, as the snarling beast that was too angry to be his Uncle Padfoot was tossed aside with a strangled yelp._

_The beast hit the (cold) stone wall and went still, patches of (warm) red blood on dark fur suddenly steaming with mist in the (cold) wind that slashed through the air in its wake._

_One of the cloaked things stood in the open doorway._

_Then two, then three._

_Harry had never seen them this close before._

_Uncle Padfoot, whether he was fuzzy (and warm) or tall and tattered (and warm) had always made sure to place himself between his Harry (James’s Harry, Lily’s Harry, Papa’s Harry, Mummy’s Harry) and the cloaked things that brought terrors in the night and cold in the shrouded sun._

_...but Uncle Padfoot wasn't here any more._

_Harry screamed._

\-------

Distantly, he could hear the voices of his year mates in Ravenclaw, loud and panicked, squawking like startled birds.

He could faintly perceive the sneers and snickers of his classmates from Slytherin turning gradually more fearful, more concerned, hissing like alarmed serpents in a way he for once could not understand.

And then, a stuttering voice cut through the squawks and hisses that Harry felt he should recognise, high pitched and panicked.

“Sir, his scar is bleeding,” a familiar voice, calm, too calm, the kind of calm that acts as a thin mask over a maelstrom of utter dread, punched through the indistinct haze of voices.

Theo.

Someone touched him, and the pain flared again.

\-------

_Up, up, up._

_Harry has always been small enough to fit under the grating of the door, but Uncle Padfoot has never liked him wandering too far on the (cold) stone staircase._

_So he’d always stayed close to the cell with a big 11 marked next to the bars, never straying past the sobbing man with rectangle glasses to the right (they aren’t like papa’s, but they sometimes remind him…) and the snarling man the screams at him on the left (Uncle Padfoot sometimes screams back at him through the wall…)_

_But now, arms locked in a grip far colder than the stone, than the water that streams from the sky, than the ice that sometimes appears on the bars, Harry is carried up, up, up._

_Before, when the cloaked things came this close to him, Harry would fade away and he’d hear the familiar screaming over and over, a high pitched voice speaking and laughing brokenly through the memory-bad dream-memory._

_He can still hear it now, faintly on repeat in the back of his ears, but Harry’s eyes are open and his voice has become too hoarse to keep screaming himself._

_Uncle Padfoot has taught him all the numbers up to 11 (because that number is important, that number is as close to home as he can get) but Harry doesn’t recognise the numbers that paint the walls as they climb up, up, up._

_He briefly spots the sobbing man with rectangle glasses as they pass, and he feels like he bloodies his throat crying out for help._

_The man (boy, not as young as Harry, but not as old as Uncle Padfoot) slowly looks up, dawning horror on his tear streaked face._

_But the one Harry was later told was named Barty Crouch Junior is too large to fit under the grate… if he even had the strength to try._

_(It was the very last time, very first time, that their eyes ever met)_

\-------

Sightless and yet able to see, Harry faded back in and out of memory as someone (something?) carried him-

( _-up, up, up-_ )

It was far louder around him than Azkaban ever was, but the pain in his head persisted. It ached, slowly growing in strength until a sharp strike, like that of a knife, cut through his scar and he succumbed once more to the waking nightmare.

\-------

_The staircase ends, one last cell at the very end, at the very top._

_The cloaked things carry him inside, the cold leeching his energy, leeching his will to fight._

_(A two year old cannot possibly do such against a dementor anyway, an older part of Harry’s mind briefly reminds him)_

_The unused sets of manacles and chains bolted into the (cold) stone come to life under the cloaked thing’s touch, and adjust to wrap around his tiny wrists and ankles, curl up his arms, pulling tight against the wall._

_They are so cold that they burn to the touch, reddening and blackening his skin even through his tattered clothes._

_He cannot move, even if he had the strength left to do so._

_And then one of the cloaked things lifts up a hand, and pulls away the hood that should be covering a face…_

_His head bursts open with agonising pain, and Harry slips away._

\-------

He could hear voices, but couldn’t discern the words attached to them.

Vague flickers of recognition attached themselves to particular tones-

(-Neville’s ever anxious questions- Theo’s not quite perfect mask of calm- Sophie’s reedy stream of unsure reassurances-)

-but it wasn’t enough for Harry to open his eyes, or to move from wherever he’d been laid.

Still half-trapped in a memory, the familiar exhaustion that followed complete and utter panic laid itself over his mind and forcibly put him to rest.

…and he dreamed a familiar dream.

\-------

(It remained one of his earliest memories, that third Halloween of his life… and the day that followed.

_When Harry awoke on the new November morning after, his wrists and ankles were bloody and charred with cold burns, as if he was thrashing uncontrollably in his sleep._

The chains always unlocked and receded after a few hours if he did not struggle against them (they merely tightened painfully if he did) and eventually, he had limped his way ‘home’, battered and shaken.

_Oddly enough, there was blood running down his forehead too, the scar that Uncle Padfoot likened to a lightning bolt having split open under the Halloween assault. A thin streak of silver colouring spread through his inky black hair over the next week, but besides that and the abused state of his body, there were no other signs of the attack._

The cloaked things, the dementors, did not try to touch him again.

…

Or at least, not until the seasons turned and the day that they eventually calculated was Halloween came once more.

At three years old, it was somehow worse than before, if only because his younger memories reminded him what was coming.

At four, he was resigned to it, and ran away from Uncle Padfoot before he could get himself hurt again while trying to protect him.

At five- At six- At seven- At eight- At nine- At ten-

_It was always the same… but for the fact more people joined the ranks of those that tried, and failed, to challenge Azkaban’s guards for Harry’s sake. It never ended well._

Over the years, the thin streaks of silver in his hair multiplied and spread, growing thicker and contrasting sharply against his natural black. The scars left by the cold manacles and chains deepened, becoming darker and larger as each year went by, matching those on the arms and legs of the more violent of the prisoners he eventually befriended.

_(-the lightning bolt above his eye bleeds and bleeds and bleeds and bleeds-)_

But despite the horror and panic of Halloween in Azkaban… it was a shallow comfort, but Harry always returned from the experience... relatively... unharmed.

_Uncle Padfoot once shakily joked, once and only once, that it was a good thing that the dementors’ aim was so terrible._

_That they always kissed his forehead instead of his lips_ )

\-------

When Harry finally awoke for real, laid out like a comatose child on a stiff bed in the hospital wing, he was alone.

It was dark out, cloudy moonlight shining through the windows, and his first thought was that he most likely missed the Halloween feast-

Harry shuddered, clenching his fists around soft hospital sheets and instinctively trying not to move… until his rational mind alerted him to the fact that nothing was binding him.

His head still hurt, but it was bandaged now. The pain was now the kind one got from a shallow cut rather than the existential, bursting out of your own skull type of ache that a dementor bearing down on you with its hood lowered would-

Harry violently shuddered again and curled in on himself, attempting to breathe slowly and deliberately, going through every single mindfulness and occlumency exercise Florian had ever taught him in a methodical manner.

His rudimentary shields had been quite comprehensively smashed to bits by the encroaching memories and subsequent panic attack, and it would take him at LEAST a week of rest and regular meditation to get them back to their former state. That is, if nothing else occurred during that time that could break them down again… Harry actively had to supress a soft whimper at the thought.

He’s at Hogwarts, he reminded himself somewhat fruitlessly. There shouldn’t even BE another trigger like that here… after all, Azkaban and its dementors were laughably far away…

…

…so then… why? Why would his scar start to hurt (start to split open even if the bandage he could feel was any indication) if it wasn’t from another attempt at- whatever it was- that the dementors had always tried to do to him on Halloween each year?

This question, cool and logical, abruptly pushed back any lingering panic Harry felt in favour of morbid (desperate) curiosity, and his thoughts immediately began to wildly spin and speculate.

His scar had only ever hurt under that very specific circumstance before leaving Azkaban… before he’d come to Hogwarts even, now he thought about it.

At first, the singular spike of pain he’d felt at the welcoming feast he’d dismissed as a fluke.

(A lingering fear that had manifested itself at the peak of his newfound freedom perhaps, having made it to Hogwarts at last)

He’d written to his former cellmates about it anyway with an offhanded theory about the Defence position curse, just in case, but the only response he’d gotten in regards to it was a brief note in Antonin Dolohov’s handwriting.

‘ _As for what you mentioned happening at the feast, try not to worry. Curses can have unexpected side effects, so keep track of it if it happens again, but as you said the original cause cannot touch you where you are now._

_You are safe_ ’

He’d accepted that explanation then.

But now… now the pain had undeniably returned without a dementor in sight-

(-unless Professor Quirrell had been hiding one in his supplies closet, which Harry found unlikely. He knew how they affected normal people, and the rest of the class had seemed perfectly fine before Harry had, er… collapsed-)

-and it had undoubtedly been what had finally triggered his meltdown in class.

Looking back on the events of the day with a clearer head, Harry was now fairly certain that the flashback/panic attack/near catatonic fit itself had… mostly… been due to his expectant anxiety over Halloween- anxiety which had in turn weakened his usual occlumency defences that kept the bad memories of previous Halloweens at bay, and unintentionally brought the traumatising events right to the surface of his thoughts.

He’d been right to burst with nerves almost as soon as Theo had unintentionally brought the subject up at breakfast… but the unexpected, yet familiar pain in DADA had clearly been what had finally sent him over the edge- turning him into a helpless, memory-bound mess for who knew how long.

That settled it, Harry thought to himself with a determined frown. He might not be able to do anything about his bad memories… but he COULD potentially find out what had been the new trigger for the pain in his forehead scar, and hopefully neutralise it before whatever it was could strike him again… whether he was in a poor enough mental state for it to trigger a similar fit or not. After all, he’d been very lucky that he’d been in class with a teacher on hand during THIS attack, or else who knew what might have hap-

And that thought made Harry suddenly pause, a realisation crossing his mind. It had only been a frivolous theory when he’d written to his old cellmates about it… but realistically, it would have been the only possible thing in his immediate vicinity feasibly dark enough in comparison to a dementor’s kiss that could have potentially caused the same reaction…

Harry leaned back on the pillow of his hospital bed, relaxing a little at last as his thoughts were taken over by this newest lead.

A baleful curse, cast by one of the strongest dark wizards in recent history no less…

It looked like Harry needed to investigate the curse on the DADA position.

\-------

Meanwhile in a certain area of the third floor, a turbaned figure whom the whole feast below believed was checking up on the poor student that had collapsed in his class earlier in the day, opened a particular door.

And then immediately closed it again before the massive three headed dog behind could bite off his leg.

Swearing something in parseltongue, Voldemort directed the terrified Professor Quirrell back to the feast before he could be missed, already making plans to subtly interrogate Rubeus Hagrid because WHO ELSE would keep something like THAT in a school full of children?! As practically the first line of defence for the stone no less?! Someone far more innocent than them could be mauled to death merely for the crime of unlocking a door!

Idiot groundskeeper, idiot headmaster, idiot professors and Flamels for going along with this…

He audibly sighed, making Quirinus squeak in fright.

Well, at least their initial scouting was done. And without having to unleash a troll on the school as a distraction either.

Harry Potter’s odd fit in class earlier that day had turned out to be quite useful… and much less suspicious towards his host than covertly hexing an older student into the hospital wing to produce the necessary excuse for leaving the feast, as Quirinus had originally been planning.

Things were going well.

Voldemort’s turban shrouded face frowned at that thought, making his host shudder and almost trip over his own feet at the feeling.

Almost… too well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for your kudos and comments, especially to the person who pointed out a plot hole in the previous chapter! It has been fixed, and rest assured that Pettigrew is nowhere near Hogwarts right now.
> 
> To clarify a point in this chapter, yes Quirrell was the one who carried Harry to the hospital wing. He suffered no self-combustion because Lily's blood protection has naturally faded from Harry after nine years away from his relatives, which is probably a good thing at this point in time. ('Yes Dumbledore, explain why the boy-who-lived suffered a fit in class and then set his teacher or fire, do go on about why its safe to keep such a traumatized boy in the school without any precautions...' - Lucius Malfoy, I imagine probably)  
> Sophie is not hatching a basilisk at this point in time (Houdini-Trevor would hardly cooperate for the necessary incubating time required), but her attempts to learn parseltongue will come up again in the future! And as for Sirius Black and the consequences of his imprisonment... well-
> 
> Next time: The long awaited trial of Sirius Black!... or, Crouch Sr. does something very stupid. (Again)


	13. The Innocence and/or Guilt of Sirius Black

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The long awaited trial of accused Death Eater Sirius Black- with colour commentary from actual Death Eaters in between!

Courtroom Ten had not been in use for a long, long time.

As both the largest and the deepest sunk into the ground of the Ministry for Magic’s twenty seven different courtrooms, closed hearing chambers, official Wizengamot meeting halls and private contract rooms, this particular courtroom was understandably unnecessary to use for anything but the most heinous and publicised of crimes… and in recent history, only the famed Death Eater Trials at the end of the you-know-who’s wizarding war had qualified.

Seeing as so many high profile individuals in the wizarding community had been accused of serving the Dark Lord and committing vile acts in his name, it had been decided early on in the war that a conviction of a ‘proven’ Death Eater could only be served by a majority vote from the ENTIRE Wizengamot; a requirement that surpassed the standard of proof necessary for practically any other crime on record.

(It was not hard to guess the motivation behind this tweak of the law considering how many of those whom had argued for it were later accused themselves… and subsequently were freed because the numbers voting for their conviction fell too low)

The very last of the Death Eater trials had been held in this very courtroom close to eight years beforehand, and it had since fallen into disuse.

There was a thick layer of dust coating the tiered stone seating that nobody had bothered to clean (it had been years since house elves had been banned from the ministry premises by particularly paranoid wizards), the runes holding the accused’s chair together had been in dire need of servicing (rumour had it that the chains had actually tried to latch on to Minister Fudge when he’d come in to lead an inspection of the courtroom) and every single one of the ever burning torches had clearly been recently replaced.

It had obviously been a rush job, cleaning up Courtroom Ten for the long awaited trial of Sirius Black, but in the end it had sufficed judging by the massive number of people that had crowded inside without complaint once the doors were open.

The public seating was absolutely packed. In fact, there’d likely been some hexes involved between the reporters whom had charged for the front row (not anything that could be proven of course), there were several Lords and Ladies of Ancient Magical Houses whom had come to view the proceedings (as an heir to one such house himself, the fate of Sirius Black drew a lot of attention from such circles) and the poor petty DMLE officers stationed at the doors had already needed to turn away at least twenty more people whom had wanted to view the trial.

The Wizengamot seating was completely full, comprised of numerous ex-legal personnel, citizens of high achievement and many other grandly qualified people whom had the honour of being nominated for their coveted positions on the judging council. Dumbledore surprisingly blended in perfectly among them in their vivid purple robes-

(-it was often said that the Chief Warlock had only accepted the role in part due to the bright uniform-)

-and they were all chattering jovially to each other while the ministry officials got their bearings. It was rare that all fifty or so of them were in the same room at once (usually a panel of ten-to-twenty of them were selected by lot for judging normal trials, and the procedure for legislation changes was largely done by owl and floo these days) so many of them were taking the opportunity to catch up with old friends and allies while they waited for the trial to start.

As for the Ministry official’s seating, a relatively small row set just in front of the Wizengamot tiers, all but one person was there. Minister Fudge, looking distinctly sweaty and nervous, was twisting his bowler hat repeatedly in his hands as his eyes darted about. Madam Bones in stark contrast at his side merely sat reading over her notes for the trial… for the fifth time that hour. The court scribe for the day sat apart from them, double and triple checking his supply of ink and parchment, and a few specially chosen aurors stood at attention before their seats.

However the minister’s senior undersecretary, a recently promoted toady of a witch called Dolores Umbridge, was notably absent from the seat on the minister’s other side. According to the owl she’d sent, she’d suddenly fallen ill that morning and would be unable to make it… and if she hadn’t already given four other excuses for being unable to be present on the four other days that had previously been proposed to hold the trial, she might have been believed.

Minister Fudge for one was starting to suspect that dear Dolores MAY have been trying to delay Sirius Black’s trial on purpose for some unknown reason… but be that as it may, it was already nearing the end of November and they really couldn’t delay any longer without a proper excuse, lest the press jump on them for breaking their word.

They’d simply have to go ahead without her.

At that moment, the great doors to the courtroom suddenly swung shut with a resounding bang, completely silencing the hall.

Every eye in the room turned towards the smaller door besides the public seating that connected to the holding cells on the floor above, and within seconds the sound of soft footsteps could be heard.

A great shudder went through the reporters and curious bystanders as a single dementor came gliding through the door, escorting a grim and ragged looking man in prison clothes… whom none the less walked with his head held high and his eyes unclouded by madness.

Sirius Black, unbound and remarkably unaffected by the avatar of cold and despair keeping hold of his arm, seemed calm and collected as he was guided over to the accused’s chair. He sat without a fuss even as the animated chains came to life and snaked over his arms.

The dementor exited the room (much to the relief of everyone gathered within) and for roughly a minute everything was so quiet you could hear the individual rustling of robes as people adjusted in their seats. Sirius Black remained relaxed and unmoving in his chair, eyeing the row of ministry officials with a look that could only be described as ‘please get on with it’.

Minister Fudge shakily stood.

“Full Wizengamot overseen trial of the twenty-second of November, 1991,” he said in a reluctant voice, the scribe immediately springing into action to record his words. “Into multiple alleged offences committed by Sirius Orion Black, most recently of Azkaban prison…,”

\-------

On the island in the North Sea where Azkaban prison was located, the weather was unseasonably sunny and warm.

There was still a light dusting of frost over the ground (as always), and clouds hung warningly in the corners of the sky, but for perhaps the first time in years the sun was shining unimpeded and brightly down upon the northern tower.

A few sea birds, braver than their kin, were easily gliding over the usually gloomy island looking for food, and the roll of the waves over the stony shore for once sounded peaceful and soothing rather than harsh and grating.

It was calm here, unusually so… or at least until-

“I CAN’T STAND THE SUSPENSE!” Phineas Travers yelled, throwing up his arms at the sky in frustration.

All around the courtyard of the northern tower, where everyone had gathered to enjoy the nice weather while it lasted, looks were exchanged and chuckles were stifled as Phineas continued to pace and fume.

“Relax Phin, there’s nothing we can do about it now,” Florian Mulciber said calmly from his customary meditation place under the now-bare cherry tree, having not even opened his eyes or shifted his pose at the outburst. “Why don’t you come sit and calm down a little?”

Phineas whirled to face him.

“Calm down?” he muttered angrily, poking an accusing finger in his direction. “Calm down?! How can I be calm when Sirius is out there facing life or death-!”

“For the last time Phineas, it is NOT a matter of life or death,” Raleigh Gibbon groaned theatrically from his place across the courtyard where he was darning some blankets. “The worst that can happen is that he gets convicted of being an unregistered animagus, and last I heard that was not a kissable offence. He’d just end up back in here if they don’t somehow clear him of everything else!”

“But-!” Phineas began to protest.

“Sirius will be fine,” Bellatrix firmly interrupted him, fixing him with one of her famous disapproving stares from where she was carefully harvesting flexible twigs from the cherry tree. “My cousin has always had a knack for getting out of the bad situations he keeps landing himself in and I doubt it will fail him now… besides, he has your advice to go on, doesn’t he?”

“You were on track for a Wizengamot seat yourself once Phineas,” Rodolphus rumbled agreeably from his wife’s side, holding the ever increasing pile of sticks she was handing to him. “And you know how stringent the requirements are to even be nominated for such a position. I doubt he could have found better legal counsel than you; even outside of this place,”

“Legal counsel doesn’t count for much if I can’t be there in court with him,” Phineas grouchily retorted, huffily ignoring the compliment and crossing his arms over his chest.

Augustus Rookwood and Antonin Dolohov exchanged eye rolls with each other from over the parchment they were scribbling on from their seats on the stairs, but said nothing.

Even though Phineas was fretting, it was true that Sirius couldn’t have been much better prepared that he was for his trial today. All of them, not least including Phineas ‘was once a lawyer’ Travers, had been helping him get ready over these past few months, and the odds were clearly in his favour.

After all, there was no doubt amidst any of them that Sirius was innocent… for obvious reasons

“Look on the bright side, if things go particularly well we might have Pettigrew joining us here in a few weeks,” Rabastan said cheerfully from where he was unravelling an old shirt for thread by Raleigh’s side.

This statement immediately summoned a chorus of groans, ‘please no’s and ‘don’t remind me’s (plus one notable ‘I’d rather share a cell with one of the Goyle’s’ from Antonin) from all around the courtyard, and Bellatrix’s face visibly twitched with annoyance at her cheeky brother in law.

Though they may not have been aware of his identity at the time, many of them remembered the disguised ‘special guest’ that had integrated himself into the Dark Lord’s inner circle in a nauseatingly sycophantic fashion at the close of the war. The constant flattery and deference had gotten on more than one Death Eater’s nerves- much to the amusement of their lord. If there was one thing Sirius had made clear about Peter Pettigrew on his many rants about the rat, it was that the double crosser had a deft silver tongue… alongside the requisite boldness to use it nigh shamelessly.

Either way, it had meant that the masked Pettigrew had gotten into the Dark Lord’s good graces with an ease that had made a lot of his pureblood servants envious… and honestly somewhat nervous that their lord might one day desire similar conduct from them.

“I must say in hindsight it’s absolutely no surprise who our lord’s secret spy turned out to be,” Edward Selwyn sighed over the notebook he was reading. “It’s a small wonder none of us ever recognised the voice or posture behind his mask during meetings. That obsequious behaviour was practically identical to the way he acted around the Order… it’s frankly embarrassing that it took Sirius pointing it out to me to realise just who it was behind that disguise,”

“Where DID Pettigrew go after that incident with the explosion anyway?” Donnell Jugson asked curiously, sitting beside a small fire where he was stewing some of their dried cherries in a sea-battered muggle tin can. “He never revealed his identity to anyone but our lord, so I doubt he would have risked going to any of our comrades for shelter…,”

There was a notable pause in the conversation as they all stopped to think on this.

Where would have Peter Pettigrew disappeared to after the war?

…even after some deliberation, none of them really had any idea.

\-------

The trial was dragging on painfully slowly.

After the initial announcement of the charges, the announcement of the interrogators and the announcement of the official documented story-

(-the ministry was being REALLY thorough this time, they didn’t want to ‘lose’ the documentation of the trial ‘again’-)

-there then came a seemingly infinite parade of witnesses both in Sirius’s defence and in favour of his conviction.

The team of aurors that had initially arrested him, whom gave their long rehearsed statements of the events on that day…

An official spokes-goblin from Gringotts whom read aloud the piece of the Potter wills that cut out one Peter Pettigrew ‘should he reveal the secret of out Fidelius Charm to our enemies’…

An unspeakable whom explained the mechanics of said charm to the less informed members of the Wizengamot…

Some ‘experts’ whom argued over a magical forensic analysis of the crime scene which clearly showed that Sirius hadn’t been in the right position to fire the killing blast himself…

A lawyer who spoke scathingly upon Sirius’s character on the behalf of his vindictive (and thankfully, recently deceased) mother…

A ministry official whom presented an obviously explosion-free _prior incantato_ of Sirius’s long confiscated wand…

So on, and so forth.

It quickly became clear that the bulk of the evidence was in Sirius Black’s favour, with multiple points implicating the maybe-not-deceased-after-all Peter Pettigrew as the actual culprit in many of the crimes he had been accused of.

(It was making it hard for many in the audience to believe that Black had ever been convicted by the full Wizengamot in the first place… which truthfully, he hadn’t, but that was besides the point- seeing as that information was still on complete lockdown courtesy of the mortified Minister Fudge)

The only charge that honestly looked like it would stick was that of being an unregistered animagus… and even then, ten years in Azkaban was far beyond even the harshest of punishments for that crime alone.

Sirius Black himself remained calm, collected and somewhat distant during the proceedings, watching everything that occurred with a critical eye and only ever speaking when directly addressed. All in all he was behaving like a model prisoner, completely unlike the dangerous and unstable madman many of his detractors were trying to make him out to be.

And then… then one Bartemius Crouch, the current head of the Department of International Magical Co-operation- and perhaps more importantly, formerly the head of the DMLE at the time of Sirius’s arrest- was called up to the witness stand.

“The first of November 1981 was a difficult time for the DMLE,” the wiry man started shortly, fixing an undisguised glare on the increasingly tense form of Sirius in the accused’s chair. “The war had officially ended mere hours before, yet there were still dozens of Death Eaters on the loose willing to cause mayhem in their dead master’s name. My aurors and the magical law enforcement patrol were all working upwards of nineteen hour days for almost a month after the fact. I will be the first to admit mistakes were made. However…,”

His eyes bored into Sirius’s, and neither man seemed willing to break their gazes.

“However, seeing as Sirius Black actually made a full confession of his crimes on that day, I find it hard to believe that he would suddenly protest his innocence now,” Crouch hissed out, drawing a round of startled noises and calls to order from around the courtroom.

Madam Bones, the current head of the DMLE, was the first to stand.

“Mr Crouch, there was never a record of a formal confession in any of Mr Black’s files, in Azkaban or otherwise,” the witch stated calmly, though there was a fire in her eyes. “What grounds do you have to make such a claim?”

Crouch opened his mouth, ready to make some scathing statement, but before he could-

“If I may speak madam?” the hoarse, growl-like voice of Sirius Black suddenly cut through the room, silencing any remaining murmurs. “I believe I may have an explanation for that,”

It was the first time that he had spoken out of turn during the whole trial, and the room was understandably cowed into silence. After a moment of hesitation, Madam Bones nodded and waved him to go ahead, earning herself a glare from Mr Crouch.

“Thank you,” Sirius politely rasped. “Now, my memories of life before Azkaban may be slightly muddled-,”

(-this caused a number of guilty looks to be exchanged around the room-)

“-but I do remember the day I was arrested quite clearly. It was not a happy day,” Sirius murmured. “I had just lost two of my best friends to the Dark Lord, and I had been forced to hand over my godson for his own safety to someone I barely knew. I was distraught, and upon making the connection that I had lost a THIRD friend as a traitor… well, I started to blame myself for everything that had happened,”

The courtroom was entirely silent. Crouch remained dutifully quiet, but his hands were clenched tightly into fists and there was a near murderous expression on his face.

“I thought that if I could catch Wormt- Peter Pettigrew and avenge James and Lily, then I could somehow offset my part in their deaths,” Sirius continued sadly, his tone that of a man that had thought many times over and finally come to accept his foolish actions. “I was initially unaware of how Worm- Pettigrew had manipulated the situation to let suspicion fall on me. He’d even once said to me that I’d be the natural choice as their secret keeper; that no one would ever think it was him, and I never even suspected…! And so, like the idiot I was on that day, I charged in to confront him and let myself be trapped all too easily. I only realised what had been done once W- Pettigrew blew up the street and left me behind in full view of the aurors,”

Sirius looked steadily into Bartemius Crouch’s eyes.

“The ‘confession’ that Mr Crouch here is likely referring to is how I kept saying ‘It’s all my fault’ at the scene where I was arrested,” Sirius finished darkly. “When I was not in a stable state of mind, and CLEARLY not entirely sane. I for one certainly remember no other statement I made that could be taken as a ‘confession’. You can even test me with veritaserum if you think it worth the price tag,”

This set off another round of murmurs in the hall. Offering to take veritaserum in an open trial was always a risky move, as ANY question asked within earshot could be inadvertently answered… even ones by unauthorised members of the public. That and combined with how expensive the potion was to make, it was rarely ever used in an official court despite its power to easily solve mysteries in criminal cases.

“I do not think that will be necessary Mr Black,” Madam Bones said loudly over the murmuring. “Mr Crouch, is what Mr Black has said correct?”

“Yes, but-,” Crouch gritted out between clenched teeth.

“But what Mr Crouch?” Madam Bones sourly interrupted. “Seeing as no official record was ever made of it, the court can hardly take such a statement right off the crime scene as a legitimate confession. And- as you might do well to remember- a simple confession is not always a true indicator of guilt. Was there anything else you wanted to say, Mr Crouch?”

Stiff and tense, Crouch said nothing for a moment.

“…but I saw him! In Azkaban when my wife made her final visit to my son!” Crouch suddenly growled, eyes appearing ablaze. “Sharing cell walls with other convicted Death Eaters and-!”

“Really? And yet you completely missed seeing Harry?” Sirius casually interrupted.

Crouch froze, mouth parted half way to his next accusation.

The whole courtroom seemed to hold its breath for a single, long moment.

And then the shouting began.

\-------

“Do you think we’ll ever see him again?” Antonin murmured to Augustus beside him. “If he’s cleared, that is?”

The atmosphere of the courtyard in the northern tower had calmed a little now that Phineas had finally stopped pacing and had taken up Florian’s suggestion to join him under the cherry tree. It honestly looked more like the man was close to falling asleep rather than meditating, even with all the dementors still on patrol around them.

“Unless new, and likely falsified, evidence comes forward in any of our cases I somehow doubt it I’m afraid,” Augustus sighed, rolling up the parchment he’d been scribbling on for the past half hour. “He’ll probably still be allowed to send us letters if he so wishes, like Harry is, but…,”

He trailed off with another heavy sigh, looking out wistfully over the sunny courtyard.

Bellatrix and Rodolphus had finished harvesting their twigs and were working together to weave some new baskets with them in one corner. Donnell was still watching over the lengthy process of stewing dried cherries into a sweet paste in time for December. Rabastan and Raleigh were working on their needlework (and knowing them, likely plotting something to pull on Augustus later), and Edward was still reading that little notebook filled with Merlin-knew what off by himself.

It already seemed quieter, more solemn, without Sirius here. He and Harry always had the kind of innocence about them that the rest of them lacked, the absence of any truly horrible deeds on their consciences. That and the fact that neither of them had ever been sworn into the service of the Dark Lord…

…

It was odd to think that their little group of hardened and devoted Death Eaters were going to actually miss that framed ex-Order of the Phoenix operative and the bloody boy-who-lived himself.

Goodness, what their Lord might have thought of tha- Oh.

OH.

“Actually, now I think about it, there is one other way our paths may cross again…,” Augustus uneasily corrected himself, unconsciously rubbing at his arm.

At the reddened and faded dark mark underneath.

Antonin caught the movement immediately and looked up at Augustus’s face in concern.

“You think that He’ll come for us…?” he hesitantly asked.

Augustus merely shrugged, clearly unsettled by his own realisation.

“…but if He does return, then Sirius and Harry will…,” Antonin continued to murmur, expression growing more strained as he trailed off.

Again, Augustus shrugged, a grimace on his face.

It was a truth that had faded to the back of their consciousness as the years in Azkaban had rolled by. That they had been, that they arguably STILL were, on opposite sides of the war. Should the Dark Lord ever return (if-when-if-when-if-) it was without question that the inmates of the northern tower would all gladly go back to His side… and that their ex-cell mates would most likely become some of His first targets.

It was… a dilemma, to say the least. Their loyalty to the Dark Lord was undeniable- but then again their relatively newer loyalties to Sirius and Harry were equally unlikely to fade.

Antonin also rolled up his scroll, biting his lip in thought.

“…you don’t suppose we might be able to convince Him to just…?” he trailed off with a slightly strained smile.

At first Augustus just blinked, blank faced.

Just…? Just let Harry and Sirius go? Just let them emigrate far away from Britain to live out their lives? Heck, just take them both as political prisoners and keep them out of the war indefinitely?

A mental image of actually straight up proposing such a course of action to a vengeful resurrected Lord Voldemort simultaneously floated across both Augustus and Antonin’s mind’s eyes.

…

And then they both started to cackle hysterically.

(The rest of the courtyard, blissfully unaware of the revelations that had come upon their two compatriots, merely sighed and knowingly tutted at the two sitting on the stairs, laughing riotously for some unknown reason.

One day, the unwelcome realisation would arrive to the rest of them as well, sparking argument, worry, desperate speculation and undoubtedly tears… but today, Antonin and Augustus later mutually resolved, would not be that day. Let the others enjoy their ignorance while it lasted)

\-------

In summary, Bartemius Crouch had NOT been arrested in the middle of the courtroom, but it had been a close thing.

It was true that Crouch and his late wife had indeed taken a trip to Azkaban, to the northern tower in fact, in December 1982 in order to visit their convicted son shortly before his untimely death. And it was also true that Barty Crouch Junior’s cell had been right next to Sirius Black’s at the time; which had presumably been the reasoning behind whatever unvoiced accusation Crouch Senior had been about to make about Black’s behaviour amongst ‘other’ Death Eaters…

…

But apparently, he seemed to have forgotten the fact that if he had looked in on Sirius Black that day, he would have almost certainly have ALSO seen Harry Potter in his cell, at that time an Azkaban veteran of ten months at the tender age of two and a half.

After hastily being forced to decide between being accused of perjury or of purposefully neglecting to mention the fact that a TODDLER had been in a dangerous criminal’s cell at the conclusion of his visit over eight years before Harry’s official discovery… Crouch had wisely (if begrudgingly) muttered that he’d merely spoken wrongly in his anger and then speedily left the witness stand.

The audience in the courtroom, not least of all a fuming Sirius Black, hadn’t been sad to see him and his baseless accusations go.

Sirius hadn’t even needed to start on what had REALLY happened during Crouch and his wife’s visit all those years ago…

_-It had been barely two months since that first, horrifying Halloween._

_Little Harry, his little pup, was already marked with scars from the chains that would likely last his whole life and his nightmares had gotten progressively worse._

_(That damned white streak through his hair didn’t look very encouraging either)_

_So when Sirius had heard footsteps; actual footsteps, rather than the sweep and murmur of dementor cloaks; he’d immediately started yelling for the presumed human guard’s attention, trying to draw their eyes to the tiny bundle wrapped up in blankets in the corner that was CLEARLY NOT MEANT TO BE HERE._

_When Bartemius Crouch Senior, the owner of the footsteps and the very man whom had driven his incarceration into Azkaban, had walked past up the stairs with his weary and weak wife at his side Sirius had been taken aback for a moment._

_Neither of them had stopped, or even looked into his cell, focused of getting to their son one cell over. They likely dismissed his ranting and yelling as that of a delusional madman._

_…_

_But none the less, that hadn’t stopped Sirius from trying to get their attention again on their way back down a few minutes later._

_(He had to get Harry OUT of here, it was no place for a child and Merlin knew what the dementors had DONE to him… what they were STILL doing to him-!)_

_And for a moment, when Crouch’s sick and pale wife looked over at him, at the sleeping bundle of child in the corner, Sirius had thought he’d succeeded._

_She’d looked horrified, and had opened her mouth to speak…_

_…only for Crouch to shush her, and continue on their way down without even looking in her direction. He hadn’t even glanced into Sirius’s… into Harry’s, cell._

_It was the last time that Sirius ever attempted to call out to the occasional human guards that passed his way. For whether it was sheer ignorance or something more malicious… just like Crouch, they never seemed to notice the little boy at his side-_

Sirius had recently learnt that Mrs Crouch had apparently died shortly after that visit, meaning that her knowledge of what she’d seen had been lost forever… and presumably before she’d had the chance to inform her. Damn. Shushing. Husband of Harry’s location.

Damn and blast it all.

…well, the past was the past, and there were already murmurs going around the courtroom that Crouch would be facing an internal investigation into his past as head of the DMLE (at the VERY least) after his… unsavoury words on the witness stand.

(Honestly? Serves the bastard right, Sirius thought)

But right now he had something far more important than his old grudge against Crouch to focus on… for the trial was wrapping up.

Doing his best to keep up the calm and statured composure that Phineas had relentlessly drilled into him over the past few months, Sirius watched and waited as the privacy-warded benches of the Wizengamot and the ministry officials deliberated blurrily.

(He deliberately did NOT look over at the public seating. He’d already realised on his way in that whom he’d hoped would be there was not… No, agonising over Moony’s notable absence from his trial was something he would do AFTER said trial was over)

Sirius knew it wasn’t the end if he wasn’t cleared of his ‘crimes’. The northern tower had grown to be more tolerable over the years, and no doubt his cousin Bellatrix at least would be secretly delighted to have him back in her company…

But Harry wasn’t there anymore. He was out here, in the real world, and he needed a proper guardian. He needed his godfather, his Uncle Padfoot, Sirius Black. The letters, while endlessly welcome, weren’t ever going to be enough.

(In the last letter alone, in which Harry seemed to deliberately go off on a tangent about the recent school Gryffindor/Slytherin quidditch match without making a single mention of Halloween… it made Sirius worry. After all these years, he KNEW when his pup was hiding something from him)

Sirius NEEDED to be cleared.

After what felt like a small eternity, the blurriness lifted from the Wizengamot and ministry seats, and Dumbledore in his capacity as Chief Warlock stood to announce their decision.

“On the charge of betraying Lily and James Potter to Voldemort, we find Sirius Black not guilty,” he announced in a _sonorous_ enhanced voice. “On the charge of murdering Peter Pettigrew and several muggle eyewitnesses to the scene, we find Sirius Black not guilty. On the charge of serving as a spy and Death Eater for Voldemort we find Sirius Black not guilty,”

Despite the in sync flinches his audience gave whenever he spoke the V-word, the response to Dumbledore’s speech garnered an explosive round of applause and cheers. Sirius let out a deep breath he didn’t know he’d been holding and sunk into the accused’s chair in relief. Those charges were what had sent him to Azkaban in the first place, so the worst of it was over. There was just one last charge left…

As expected, Dumbledore quieted the rest of the room with a benevolent smile and a wave of his hand signalling he wasn’t quite finished yet.

“On the charge of being an unregistered animagus however, we regretfully find Sirius Black guilty,” Dumbledore announced, to some squawked protests from the public seating. “However, seeing as he was prevented from registering earlier by his incarceration, the penalty the Wizengamot has assigned had been reduced significantly. And there is still the matter of reparations for his unjust imprisonment to consider, which will likely offset this penalty entirely should he register immediately. Minister Fudge, if you would?”

At this, he took his seat once again and the Minister for Magic rose.

“Effective immediately, Sirius Orion Black is considered a free man by the Ministry for Magic, and his record will be expunged of the false charges that led to his illegal incarceration in the first place,” Minister Fudge declared in a squeaky voice, looking fairly relieved himself that the trial was coming to an end. “An auror task force will be set aside to investigate Peter Pettigrew’s supposed death… and to bring charges against him if he is indeed alive,”

He cleared his throat nervously, looking down at Sirius directly.

“As reparation for the… suffering in Azkaban Mr Black went through-,” Minister Fudge started saying somewhat reluctantly… and was promptly given a dark look by Madam Bones to make him get on with it. “-the Ministry for Magic will return his wand and pay for his treatment in St Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries as he readjusts to society. The ministry will also pay the reduced fine for his period of unregistered animagery, and in addition will award him 700 galleons for each year he was unjustly imprisoned,”

Sirius blinked quickly in surprise, doing some mental math. That was at least 7000 galleons… It could have been even higher had he not had the animagus charge to cover, but that was still a LOT of money. No wonder the minister had been so hesitant to announce it. And come to think of it, since his mother was dead he’d also likely inherited the Black family fortune… oh Merlin maybe he should have sat in on Harry’s lessons with Edward Selwyn more often…

So lost in thought, Sirius didn’t notice that the Minister had sat down and Madam Bones had stood up until she began to speak.

“And in conclusion, once Sirius Black had been deemed healthy both in body and mind by the St Mungo’s staff, the ministry will also officially recognise his guardianship of Harry James Potter,” Madam Bones said evenly, though there was a satisfied smile twitching on her lips. “We now declare the trial of Sirius Orion Black on this day, the twenty-second of November, over. Mr Black, you are free to go,”

At this statement the courtroom erupted in supportive cheers, and Sirius couldn’t help the broad smile on his face. It was over. He was free.

He moved to stand up- and frowned, looking down at his still chained arms. Despite the innocent verdict, the accused’s chair seemed reluctant to let him go.

Sirius turned a very weary and unamused look back up at the official seating.

“Er- Could we get that rune servicer back in here stat?!” Minister Fudge squeaked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all who continue to comment and give kudos!
> 
> To those who are wondering about Harry's horcrux status- unfortunately, the dementors were unable to remove the shard stuck in his forehead (hence why they kept trying year after year on the anniversary of its implantation). Whether it was because they were merely hungry or trying (failing) to be helpful... or because of some other reason, is yet to be seen. They sure as hell aren't going to tell the guards that can actually communicate with them!
> 
> A note on the Wizengamot- seeing as Rowling hasn't published much specific information about it (or at least not that I can easily find), I've headcannoned here that the Wizengamot is a panel of supposedly 'neutral' elected jurors, nominated by the ministry for various achievements in fields related to law and justice. The Lords and Ladies of Ancient Magical Houses cannot serve on the Wizengamot (because of almost certain bias towards their families and estate related interests), but still have certain privileges in being able to independently draft laws that can go before it and legally being able to... ahem, 'sponsor' certain bills. I will expand more on this later in the series, but that's all that's really relevant for this book.  
> I hope it all makes sense!
> 
> Next time: Christmas comes to Hogwarts... or, the Quiet Ones' investigation into the DADA curse begins


	14. Christmas Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Christmas comes to Hogwarts, and to say the least it is vastly different from Christmas in Azkaban!

Christmas in Azkaban was… different to Christmas at Hogwarts.

Sure, there were decorations in both-

(-though the simple, string tied garlands of dried cherries they used to hang over the bare tree in the courtyard paled in comparison to the bushels of holly and evergreens and mistletoe and sparkly ornaments that flooded the great hall-)

-and there was special food-

(-the small cherry pastes, puddings and other ersatz food inventions had always been much appreciated as an alternative to the Azkaban gruel, but in Hogwarts WEEKS before Christmas there was already sweet gingerbread and colourful candies appearing on the tables at dessert-)

-and there were gifts being prepared-

(-but it was clear that the stingy arts, crafts and clever IOU notes that were exchanged as gifts back in the northern tower were vastly underused out in the Wizarding world, where owl-order gift catalogues began appearing in the student common rooms for those who couldn’t go to Hogsmeade weeks before the actual date-)

-and there was COPIOUS amounts of snow-

(-Harry hadn’t willingly left the castle since some point in mid-November except for Herbology and flying lessons. If he had a choice he was staying inside where it was WARM thank you very much-)

-but really, it was all very, VERY different, despite the on-the-surface similarities.

Really!

The weeks before Christmas were already slipping by one by one, classes winding down before the winter holidays began and preparations beginning for the celebrations, and Harry was feeling both very excited and horribly apprehensive of the upcoming date all at once.

After all, the last wizarding holiday he’d experienced out of Azkaban hadn’t exactly ended very well…

( _On the morning of November first, after Harry had made his midnight promises to himself and fallen back asleep, he’d awoken to the sound of Theo arguing with Madam Pomfrey at the doors of the hospital wing, sounding (slightly) hysterical._

_‘You gave us all a bit of a fright Harry,’ Neville had said partly nervously, partly in relief as he’d sat at Harry’s bedside after Madam Pomfrey had been appeased. ‘Sophie and I were coming back from Herbology when we saw Professor Quirrell rushing through the hallways with you in his arms,’_

_‘You were bleeding from your head,’ Sophie added tremulously from her place at the other side of the bed. ‘We thought some spell had gone wrong in class or…,’_

_Sophie had trailed off, eyes glancing over at Theo, whom after being scolded by Madam Pomfrey for his language had immediately taken the seat closest to Harry’s side. He’d taken Harry’s hand in his own and hadn’t yet let it go, that and his nervously bitten lips the only outward sign of the Slytherin’s continued worry. His eyes were downcast and his posture was as rigid as ever._

_All of them were silent for a moment as Theo’s throat worked, trying to garner the courage to speak._

_‘You don’t have to tell me- tell any of us- what happened,’ eventually he lowly said, still not meeting Harry’s eyes. ‘But I thought we’d lost you, for a moment there. If there’s anything we can do…?’_ )

In the end, Harry hadn’t told any of his friends exactly what had happened to him that day, not wishing to go into the details of the awful flashback or the horrors of Halloweens past… none of them deserved to be burdened with that kind of knowledge. But he HAD told them his suspicions about the DADA curse, including a cursory (hah!) admittance that it may have had something to do with his reaction during that class.

And oh BOY had his friends responded to THAT.

Within a week of his collapse, Sophie had already sight-read through and taken basic notes on no less than SIX different books on ‘name-and-place curses’ that she’d scrounged up from the library with Madam Pince’s help, Theodore had subtly cosied up to Professor Quirrell himself after their classes (much to the professor’s clear discomfort) to badger him about his feelings on his ‘teaching position’, and Neville…

Oh Merlin, Neville had actually snuck into the DADA classroom that very weekend while the teachers were away at a staff meeting, alone and without prompting, and had proceeded to do charcoal rubbings of as many of the subtle ingrained room-warding runes on the walls and doorframes as he could find in an hour.

(“We’ll need to cross check with a senior runes textbook to be sure, but if we can find out if one of these rune patterns aren’t standard for warding a classroom for active student spellcasting or the like, then it might be an anchor for the curse! I went with the ones closest to where Harry and Theo’s seats were at first- what?”

“…,”

“…,”

“…,”

“…um, why are you all looking at me like that?”

“…Neville, if anyone ever doubts that you belong in Gryffindor ever again, remember this moment okay?”)

Harry had thrown himself into his own area of research with a passion, collecting the information his friends fed him and trying to tie it down to any number of magical effects that he’d heard of, read about, or even seen before. However, considering the thousands of varied ways the tenure of former DADA teachers had met their ends in the past, this of course was a MASSIVE field he had to narrow down.

But, one by one, little by little, they whittled away at the least likely possibilities and got into the more plausible candidates for what exactly the DADA ‘curse’ actually was.

By the time December had arrived and Harry had received word that Uncle Padfoot had been formally released from Azkaban-

(-after some skilful finagling on Sophie’s part with the house elves via Hufflepuff’s kitchen connection, they’d all had a small party filled with treacle tart, chocolate muffins and cherry Danishes in an unused classroom to celebrate the occasion-)

-they’d already ruled out several standard bad luck curses (seeing as Professor Quirrell didn’t display any of the other readily visible symptoms of such a spell), a rune based place-curse (seeing as none of the students of DADA had been affected as badly as the professors in the past had been by the presumed curse) and a number of other common and less common possibilities.

…well, at least it was a start.

And for now, at least, it seemed like their investigatory efforts were going to be put on hold as the winter holidays arrived. Theo and Neville had both been summoned back home to their families for the Christmas/Yule season-

(-and both had seemed comically similar in their unease at the prospect of having to inform their respective guardians of their unusual friendship. Theo had also mentioned a younger sister he had to get home to, which had Harry raising an eyebrow; it appeared Phineas’s information on the remains of the Nott family had been somewhat outdated-)

-while Sophie and Harry were staying behind at Hogwarts for the duration. Harry because Uncle Padfoot was still technically under evaluation in St Mungo’s (and likely would remain so until Spring at least, knowing the overzealous healers), and Sophie because both of her parents had been called out on a company business trip for the season, so she and her older muggle siblings would be staying with her overly-religious aunt anyway if they returned home.

(Sophie’s mum and dad were apparently some kind of bigwigs in the muggle business world, though she never said for what company they worked. Considering some of the secrets Harry kept himself, he’d decided not to press her for details)

Before they knew it, the four of them were waving goodbye to each other in the entrance hall as crowds of students made their way down to the apparently ‘horseless’ carriages waiting for them out in the snow. And coincidentally, Harry got his first proper look at a live herd of thestrals at the same time.

(Whether it was one of those distant figures Harry had watched collapse from afar in the dangerous landscape of Azkaban Island, swarmed by dementors, or his far-too-vivid memory of his own mother’s demise that had done the trick for him… well, he couldn’t really say. But he’d ended up on ‘thestral description duty’ none the less once Sophie had become curious about what was pulling the carriages out of sight through the snow)

\-------

(“Quirrell, I am starting to question your sanity,”

“M-my lord, I-,”

“I don’t care who your contact is. I don’t care how fast you can get it from them. You are NOT giving Hagrid a dragon’s egg for Christmas!”

“B-but it’s something he’s always wanted, surely he’d be willing to trade the information about the Cerberus for-,”

“Quirrell! Does it not occur to you what will happen when the brute is inevitably found with a baby dragon in tow? There will be questions asked, and Dumbledore is not so much a fool as to assume his groundskeeper would have simply stumbled upon it in the forbidden forest!”

“I’m sorry Master b-but I don’t know what else I can do!”

“…look, Quirrell. There will soon be an opportune moment when we can get Hagrid’s guard down and coerce the information SUBTLY from him. Until then, can you at least TRY not to act so suspicious in front of your co-workers?”

“I beg y-your pardon my lord, but I j-just thought that if I could find Potter in the crowd at the Quidditch match, a curse or two might have gone unnoticed in the confusion-,”

“For. The. Last. Time. NO attempts on ANYONE’S life until AFTER we’ve got the stone! That INCLUDES Harry Potter!”

“Eep! Y-yes Master!”

“*sigh* Just be grateful I haven’t needed you to go out hunting unicorns yet… however, if this streak of poor decisions continue, we may be left no other option. Your body is already starting to deteriorate… I’d suggest you keep that in mind Quirrell, if you require further motivation to keep on task,”

“…,”)

\-------

Christmas morning dawned silently.

Harry was completely alone in the first year Ravenclaw boy’s dormitory, most of his year mates having gone home for the holidays. It was quieter, both in sound and magically, without so many people around, and he felt more relaxed than he had been in ages.

He snuggled down into the plush mattress and thick woolly blankets that had been gradually piling up on his bed as the days had grown colder, enjoying the toasty warmth for as long as humanly possible.

The prefects had shown mercy and called off the house-wide morning alarm for those staying at Hogwarts for the holidays, meaning that over the past few class-free days (and for the first time possibly ever in his life) Harry had been able to enjoy the luxury of sleeping in.

There was something delightfully indulgent about not having to get up before ten- or even eleven- if he didn’t want to, and Christmas morning or no Harry didn’t want to leave his luxurious cocoon of fuzziness just yet.

…

But then again, he HAD promised to meet Sophie at lunchtime for the school’s ‘Christmas dinner’, so eventually he poked one reluctant hand out of his blankets to snatch his glasses from the bedside table.

One by one, the rest of his limbs followed into the still warm (thanks to the little stove dutifully piping away in the corner) yet not-quite-as-toasty-as-his-blanket-cocoon dormitory… and he was promptly arrested by the sight of a modest pile of gifts piled on top of his trunk at the end of his bed.

Logically, knowing both what had happened on his birthday and the fact that his friends had all been asking some rather suspicious questions of each other timed at the start of the Christmas season, Harry knew he would likely be getting SOME presents today, but seeing the actual stack of brightly wrapped boxes and bundles still sparked something childish and excited in his heart that the intimidating load of anonymous birthday gifts back at St Mungo’s had failed to ignite.

Creeping over to the end of his bed with a blanket still draped over his shoulders, Harry gazed down at the pile with a growing smile on his face, reading tags labelled with names he knew and recognised.

There were a number of small tokens, sweets and the like, from passing acquaintances whom had likely left the gifts behind with house elves or teachers to pass on to him on the day. There were also six larger parcels in total, one from Theo, one from Sophie, one from Neville, one from Uncle Padfoot, an unlabelled parcel wrapped in an all too familiar grey cloth that clearly heralded its origins… and another unlabelled one that Harry couldn’t quite place.

Frowning, Harry picked up that one first. He couldn’t guess who it might have been sent by… and therefore it probably shouldn’t be here. After all, since the mass of gifts he’d received on his birthday, Harry had been in near-constant correspondence with the National Owl-Office Bureau to try and curb the intense amount of fan-mail he’d inevitably keep receiving.

A mass ‘return-to-sender’ owl ward on his name with exceptions only for certain named individuals (which was what Dumbledore, as his de-facto magical guardian, had apparently had him placed under for the majority of his childhood; however that ward had been recently dismantled during the ‘Azkaban fiasco’) had seemed a little too extreme for Harry at first…

…but after so many owls had continued to barge into St Mungo’s mail room looking for him, he’d eventually given in and authorised them to bring the ward back up- with two major differences. First, that Harry himself was in charge of the ‘authorised senders’ list rather than a third party, and secondly that any rejected letter/parcel and their senders (if known) would be automatically catalogued into a list sent to Harry fortnightly so he could tell if he’d missed anything/anyone important and contact them if need be.

This unidentified gift had somehow bypassed those precautions… meaning either it had been sent via house elf or teacher through Hogwarts like the multitude of Harry’s smaller gifts had been, or there had been some especially powerful seeking magic behind its delivery that had somehow overcome the redirect.

Suspicious, Harry tentatively picked up his wand from his bedside table (it seemed to pulse happily at his touch, a reaction he mostly ignored out of months of experience of the same) and muttered a few basic detection spells over the plain paper he’d learnt from his luggage security book.

It wasn’t obviously jinxed or hexed at least, as the soft colours that flashed over the wrapping proclaimed, and such a light and squishy object was unlikely to be otherwise dangerous.

Taking a deep breath, Harry deftly opened up the package, wand at the ready.

…

It was cloth. Magical cloth. Where his wand pulsed with almost a heartbeat of sorts, this cloth seemed to flow up his fingertips like warm water as he touched it, though just what KIND of magic it was clearly radiating was hard for him to tell. Silvery-grey in colour and as fluid as silk, Harry picked up the gift in bewilderment, running his hand over the soft material and holding it up against the light from the windows.

Correction, it appeared to be a cloak. Hooded, with simple cloth ties and the same, unchanging colour all over, it was large enough to cover a fully grown adult head to toe. As he unfolded it, a slip of paper fell out of its folds and onto the bedsheets.

Frowning now, Harry refolded the (admittedly quite pretty) cloak neatly over one arm and bent over to pick up the note.

‘ _Your father left this in my possession before he died. It is time it was returned to you. Use it well. A Very Merry Christmas to you_ ’

Harry’s frown deepened. Someone whom his father knew and trusted then. Admittedly, that didn’t exactly thin the pool of candidates much, at least according to the stories Sirius had told him. And why would they send him one of his dad’s old (if comfy looking) cloaks he’d left behind for Christmas?

The handwriting was oddly familiar, but unlike the many hands of the Death Eaters of Azkaban, Harry couldn’t identify its owner on sight. He glanced over at the cloak on his arm-

-and nearly fell off the bed at realising that both the cloak, and his arm, seemingly had vanished into thin air.

…

Well, that answered one question.

\-------

Putting The Invisibility Cloak aside-

(-and Harry now had absolutely no doubt whatsoever that was what it was, capitals and all, Sirius had told him far too many tales about how his father had gotten up to mischief at school with the ancient Potter heirloom-)

-along with the question of just WHOM had had it in their possession all this time, Harry decided to clear out his thoughts by opening the rest of his Christmas gifts.

Starting with the token ones, Harry quickly built up a respectable pile of chocolate frogs, every-flavour beans, colour changing caramels, ice mice and most any other magical sweet he could think of from a bewildering assortment of classmates and seniors.

Seeing as knew next-to-none of these people (and remembering Donnell Jugson’s many, MANY cautionary tales about ‘gift poisoning’) Harry dutifully cast an all-purpose potion detection charm over each treat before storing them away in his newly named ‘sweet stash’, hosted on an unused shelf in his library trunk compartment.

For a while, he wondered with every unaffected lolly whether or not he was even casting the spell correctly… until a packet of fizzing whizzbees from one Anastasia Rosier lit up unmistakably under his wand with the lurid pink glow that indicated a minor love potion.

(He triple checked the rest of his new stash after that fright, but thankfully that appeared to be the only spiked treat he’d been gifted. Anastasia, a girl whom Harry neither knew nor had ever met to his knowledge, was now someone firmly on his ‘to be suspicious of’ list)

Once all of the smaller gifts were out of the way, scanned and stored, Harry finally got onto what he felt was the main event.

The gifts from his godfather, the residents of the northern tower and the Quiet Ones.

Spoilt for choice looking at the five packages before him, Harry closed his eyes and reached for one at random.

He ended up picking up the heavy, brick shaped package that Sophie had sent to him first. While carefully pulling apart the muggle tape and ‘Santa’ printed wrapping paper, he nearly missed the addendum in tiny cursive attached to the label saying:

‘ _Thank you for being such a good friend to our daughter. Albert and Marie Roper_ ’

Sophie’s parents, Harry guessed as he pulled away the last of the paper to reveal a boxed set of three VERY thick muggle hardcover books. ‘The Complete Works of Shakespeare’ the covers proudly stated, each tome subtitled respectively with ‘Comedies’, ‘Tragedies’ and ‘Mysteries/Poems/Sonnets’.

Grinning, Harry valiantly resisted the urge to open any of the books immediately, knowing he’d likely be sucked in should he start to read now. He couldn’t thank Sophie in person at lunchtime if he was reading after all.

The next gift he chose was the cloth wrapped parcel from Azkaban (he suspected the ‘wrapping’ was likely one of the more threadbare old blankets that could be spared) containing, as expected, an expertly woven cherry twig basket containing a new load of fire-dried cherries, a muggle tin can (likely scrounged from the Azkaban coastline by one of the snakes) half-full of a handmade stewed cherry paste, and a lengthy letter filled with Christmas and Yule good will.

Harry’s grin widened in delight. He’d almost completely finished the small amount of cherries he’d taken with him from Azkaban in the first place, having recently gotten into the habit of chewing on one before bed if he was finding it hard to get to sleep and his occlumency exercises weren’t quite calming enough.

After all, he still couldn’t go wandering around the castle at night like he used to in the northern tower due to curfew, and since Halloween he’d been finding that truly peaceful nights were coming farther and fewer between… Although, Harry suddenly realised, he did have The Invisibility Cloak now. But at that rebellious thought, he shook his head sternly.

(For insomnia emergencies ONLY, Harry decisively decided, before moving on)

Placing the letter aside to read properly later-

(-he briefly wondered if his own letter and ‘gift’ he’d sent to Azkaban had made it through the guard’s censorship; he certainly hadn’t received any reprimands from the ministry yet so he assumed it had-)

-he picked up Neville’s gift, which was also suspiciously book-shaped.

Parting the wrapping paper covered in animated Christmas bells silently ringing, Harry revealed to his surprise NOT a book, but a carved wooden box (which in his defence, was roughly the shape of a large, flat book) depicting decorative boughs of holly and phoenixes. The wood itself, he surmised, was also likely holly from its appearance.

Undoing the silver latch, he opened the box curiously to reveal a blue silk lining with an indent just about wand-shaped diagonally across it, alongside a frankly unnecessary explanatory note from Neville stating the box was meant to store one’s wand when not in use; usually while sleeping. The latch was apparently enchanted only to open to the current recognised owner of the wand, or so the note said, to which Harry noted the near invisible runes engraved into the box amidst the decorative carvings likely holding said charm.

Nodding to himself approvingly, he put the box directly on his bedside table for later use, and pulled Theo’s emerald green parcel towards him.

…and Harry froze for a moment, noticing a similar addendum on the label as there had been on Sophie’s gift that read in elegant golden script:

‘ _The House of Nott wishes the House of Potter a happy and prosperous Yule. Lord Quentin Nott- Theodore and Odette_ ’

His wand was in hand and casting a barrage of detection spells before Harry was even consciously aware of what he was doing, but the parcel remained innocently inert, every result coming back both safe and neutral.

Letting out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding, Harry slumped back down on his bed and tried to calm his racing heart. Theodore was one thing. He was his friend, and had solidified that friendship with Harry over the course of the last four months. His FATHER Quentin on the other hand, was both an unknown… and yet had quite the reputation preceding him.

Shaking his head to clear it, Harry carefully opened the parcel, trying not to rip the delicate green tissue and failing miserably.

…

Huh, it looked like cloaks were becoming a theme this Christmas, Harry found himself thinking as he lifted the exquisitely tailored garment out of its packaging. Like The Invisibility Cloak, this cloak had a deep hood and was made of a wonderfully soft and warm feeling material.

Unlike The Invisibility Cloak, this one was an earthy forest green with a nondescript grey lining and silver clasps, and was actually sized to fit an eleven year old of Harry’s stature rather than an adult… though with notably pinned up hems that could someday be let out. No feeling of unnatural heat, or tingling, or any other indication of overt enchantment attuned to him met Harry’s fingers as he brushed them along the material, which he found himself thankful for.

No overt magic meant no HARMFUL magic either. If Quentin had intended any kind of message by adding his subtitle onto his son’s gift, clearly it hadn’t been hostile in nature.

Putting the handsome cloak aside, Harry finally picked up his last gift, the one he’d been best trying to ignore since he’d first spotted it. Long, thin and wrapped in plain brown paper, it was labelled with nothing more but a playful:

‘ _With the love of a Marauder, your Uncle Padfoot_ ’

…

It was suspiciously, and unmistakably, broom shaped.

\-------

(“A NIMBUS 2000?!”

“Not so loud! But yes, really, a Nimbus 2000! I TOLD Uncle Padfoot that first years aren’t supposed to have brooms… but I guess he took that as a challenge rather than a warning,”

 “Have you told any of the teachers yet?”

“Weeeell… I really should inform Professor Flitwick at least, as my head of house,”

“Oh… that’s too ba-,”

“But I don’t see why we can’t wait until the end of the day… after we’ve taken it out for a bit of a test fly!”

“*Squeals in excitement*,”)

\-------

A few hours later that afternoon, if anyone noticed that one Harry Potter and his friend Sophie Roper arrived at Christmas dinner looking more than a little windswept and with stupidly wide grins on their faces, nobody commented.

(Though the twin Weasley’s grinned back at them conspiratorially from the other end of the table. The red-haired terrors had somehow been able to find them earlier out on the snowbound Quidditch pitch despite the younger student’s careful precautions not to be seen… and had to be subsequently bribed into silence with their own turns on Harry’s new racing broom)

The usual five house-and-staff tables in the great hall had been long since replaced by a single great round table for the holidays-

(-presumably to cut down on food wastage and the workload of the house elves, considering how few people remained at the school for the Christmas season. The usual castle population of hundreds had been reduced down to roughly fifty after all-)

-and it was no different today, with teachers rubbing shoulders with their students and most any kind of house or year separation scattered to the four winds.

The table practically groaned under the weight of no less than nine massive turkeys (Harry had counted!), platters of thin sausages wrapped in crispy bacon, bowls of mashed potatoes (of both the ordinary and sweet varieties) and solid blocks of cheesy, creamy potato bakes, trays of roast pumpkin, turnips and baby onions, gravy boats and jugs of cranberry sauce, tureens of buttered peas, carrots and brussel sprouts… and the ever present bowls of mint humbugs that always graced the tables during feasts such as these, and which Harry had noted only ever seemed to be eaten by the Headmaster.

Slowly eating some tender turkey breast alongside a substantially larger amount of buttery carrots, roast pumpkin and a crispy corner slice of potato bake, Harry for the most part sat back and let the atmosphere of the feast wash over him. Sophie on his right was similarly quiet as she ate- though that may have been more because everyone else in the hall was so loud that their own voices would be drowned out should they attempt to get into a conversation of their own.

The teachers and of-age sixth/seventh year students in particular got increasingly rowdy as the feast went on, having been sipping on mulled wine and spiced mead instead of the milder drinks being sent up to the younger seats at the table.

(In fact, a very intoxicated Hagrid later planted a wet kiss onto the cheek of one somewhat alarmed Professor Quirrell just before the mains were cleared in favour of the puddings, the act drawing gales of laughter from all around the table…

…which in turn summoned a grumpy looking Filch, the ‘designated sober adult’ for the day, to drag Hagrid back to his hut outside before the large man got even further out of control, much to the poor turbaned professor’s clear relief)

The numerous Christmas puddings were sent up to the table literally on fire, which startled Harry at first. (Sophie later explained to him that this was deliberate. Muggles apparently did the same thing- it was just a bit of alcohol being burned off on top for flavour and dramatic effect)

There were several traditional candied fruit puddings, a few that were chocolate flavoured with fudgy sauce on the side, two syrupy confections with warnings on their serving plates proclaiming that a lucky sickle was hidden within, and even one that was coated in a delicate layer of caramel… but honestly, Harry stuck more to the lighter nibbles of spiced Christmas biscuits, dried fruit and candied nuts that rounded out the desserts.

(That earlier potato bake in particular had been VERY nice, and as such Harry had next to no stomach space left for sweets)

Explosive wizarding Christmas crackers had been exchanged all throughout the feast so far, but it was only now that Harry felt brave enough to pull one with Sophie. As expected, they both nearly fell off their seats at the loud bang and flash of light that had ensued, and all they got for their trouble was a silly jester’s hat and a set of wizarding chess pieces that neither of them would likely use.

They rounded off the feast by cornering a slightly tipsy Professor Flitwick on the way out of the hall with news of Harry’s… slightly against the rules gift from his godfather.

(Thankfully though, the hiccoughing professor seemed amenable enough to Harry keeping the broom for the rest of his first year, on the condition that he only use it when there was some kind of adult supervision available)

\-------

Already worn-out and sleepy from both their illicit practice with Harry’s broom earlier that morning and from the noisy feast, Sophie and Harry retreated to the peace of the library for the rest of Christmas day.

It was even quieter than usual, with most of the remaining student body heading outdoors to play in the snow-

(-Harry could spot several heads of Weasley-red hair through the window. Had all of them stayed behind for Christmas?-)

-and with two of their own group missing from their usual ‘Quiet Ones’ table.

The first thing Harry did was thank Sophie for the Shakespeare books she’d gifted him, to which she responded with a great deal of blushing and ‘don’t mention it’s. She’d apparently owled her parents to buy the set on her behalf, remembering how Harry had mentioned on the Hogwarts Express that he didn’t have any of the plays himself.

“I got similar things for Theo and Neville actually,” Sophie admitted shyly, rubbing the back of her neck awkwardly. “A muggle book on botany for Neville and a set of history books about the world wars for Theo. There’s no moving pictures like there are in wizard books but…,”

“I’m sure they’ll love them,” Harry reassured her, privately pushing away his own worries that Theo’s father might not approve of such a muggle gift. “I actually got Neville one of those hanging flower-pots myself. One of the ones enchanted to float?”

“Oh! I think I saw those in one of the owl-order catalogues myself!” Sophie exclaimed, before her expression turned confused. “But then, what did you get Theo?”

Unconsciously perhaps, Harry noticed her moving to clasp her right forearm and he smiled.

Without further ado, Harry rolled up his own right hand sleeve and laid his arm on the table, making Sophie’s eyes gleam.

“Same as I did for the rest of you,” Harry said with a small smile. “I just made sure to get Neville something else too since he already has one. In fact, he probably already guessed I was making them after all the questions I asked him about it …,”

And Sophie actually giggled, rolling up her own sleeve to reveal a near identical cloth wand holster to the one wrapped snuggly around Harry’s forearm, holding her willow and phoenix feather wand.

Plain, Azkaban grey (Harry had cannibalised his fraying old uniform for both the gifts and his own new holster, having been unable to find an owl-order catalogue for proper leather in time) and triple braided into stiff lengths that fastened their wands firmly into place, Harry’s handmade wand holsters were otherwise identical in design to the leather one that Neville had inherited from his father.

They’d been tricky for Harry to make, considering he was working with flimsier materials than he would prefer, but after a great deal of experimentation he was able to copy the design near-perfectly; right down to being able to draw a stored wand with a mere flick of the wrist.

“Matching wand holsters,” Sophie smiled softly, running a finger over the wood of her wand against her wrist. “…we just need to get some official ‘Quiet Ones’ uniforms now,”

At this strange mental image, Harry snorted, causing Sophie to snicker, which caused him to start chuckling, which in turn led to them both desperately trying to stifle laughter in the near silent library.

Sitting around the corner at her desk cataloguing some new books, Madam Pince simply rolled her eyes with a fond smile at the noise… She could make an exception for her favourites, just for today.

\-------

(“Music calms the savage beast… of course, we should have realised this before!”

“…,”

“We’ll need to charm some kind of instrument to keep playing while we search the room, something soft like a pipe or a flute that won’t be heard through the door… a harp might work if we can get it to the third floor without detection,”

“…,”

“And once we’ve discerned what the next obstacle is, we can begin research to overcome it. Surely not every task will have some obscure way to bypass it known only by the teacher who placed it… unlike Hagrid’s baffling creature knowledge… Quirrell? You’re being very quiet…,”

“…*mumble mumble mumble*…,”

“Oh for the love of- *sigh* Quirrell, it was JUST a kiss. On the CHEEK,”

“But- But-!”

“We have the information we need, and Hagrid will likely not even remember the event! Pull yourself together!”)

\-------

In St Mungo’s hospital, in the Janus Thickey ward, Neville Longbottom and his grandmother made their annual Christmas visit.

(Alice braided her son’s hair full of candy wrappers again, and Frank argued with increasing lucidity over werewolf registration laws with his mother… though admittedly he merely was saying ‘no’ repeatedly to whatever scathing report she tried to repeat to him. The ward healers merely stood back and documented their patient’s improving (?) behaviour with increasing incredulity)

A few rooms away, Sirius Black’s eyes gleamed with happy tears over the brightly wrapped present his godson had sent him.

(It was three small, hand sewn, stuffed animals. One in the shape of a stag with ink drawn antlers on its flat head, one a dog with little button eyes and the last a wolf… that honestly looked very similar in design to the dog. They were all sewn out of Azkaban grey cloth, but Sirius didn’t care. They were perfect)

In a sprawling, near empty manor house some distance from London, Theodore Nott sat politely beside his father and sister, dutifully ignoring the assorted arrangement of political allies sitting all around him.

(Pureblood politics, words and spite, powerful families doing their best to subtly one-up each other around a formal dinner with archaic manners… Merlin it was exhausting. His fellow Slytherin year mates, while clearly not masters of their parent’s craft just yet, imitated their snide double-speak with unnerving ease. He discretely fidgeted with the new grey wand holster under his sleeve and reminded himself that he only had to endure this for another few weeks)

Out in the country, in a warded, ramshackle house with a deep basement that had far too many locks on the door, a solitary owl left a gift on the dusty dining room table and flew away.

(‘ _To Moony, from Padfoot. P.S. Please talk to me_ ’ the tag read. The large box of chocolate frogs inside would go uneaten, the wrapping left pristine and unopened. Just like the increasing pile of letters sitting underneath… and soon to be, on top as well…)

And somewhere in the North Sea, after a great deal of argument amongst the human guards and some bartering with a noticeably unhappy dementor, two plain wrapped packages that had already been opened once for inspection made their way to a certain tower.

(As per usual, Florian Mulciber was the first recipient of the mail by virtue of his chosen meditation spot. He smiled as he opened the first of the triple-checked packages… and laughed as he opened the second, drawing a crowd of his curious cell-mates down to the courtyard with the cherry-string draped tree. Dear, sweet Harry had sent each of them a new, soft wool blanket in a variety of different colours…

…whereas Sirius had sent them a single muggle metalworking file that would be utterly useless on the tower’s warded bars, on top of a much more useful, extra-large package of pumpkin pasties for them to share. Bellatrix and Phineas both tutted disapprovingly while trying to hide their smiles, but everyone else was laughing harder than they ever had since their former cellmates had left)

And thus, a Merry Christmas was… generally… had by all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thanks to all who left comments and kudos!
> 
> Unfortunately we won't be seeing Sirius again in person for a while (those healers at St Mungo's are scary!), and we won't be seeing Remus for even longer (for... reasons). But they will (eventually) be back!  
> As for the Death Eaters in Azkaban, their dilemma over Harry and Sirius vs. The Dark Lord will be a major plot point in the future. As one user noted, it's not so much a question of purely good vs. evil for them either- they're people who have done terrible things (hence their places in Azkaban in the first place) and in many cases would gladly do so again for their master... but their retained sanity and attachment to Sirius and Harry has made their outlooks, their behavior and their fates wildly different from how they ended up in the cannon story.  
> Not least because of how little they're now affected by dementors... and that will be explained really soon! (As in, within two or three chapters soon!)
> 
> Next Time: The gauntlet of the Philosopher's Stone is finally tested... or, meanwhile, Harry finds an odd mirror


	15. The Mirror and the Gauntlet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Quiet Ones' research on the DADA curse goes on hold, Harry breaks curfew, and Voldemort gets increasingly suspicious...

The Defence Against the Dark Arts curse had long been speculated upon by both students and teachers of Hogwarts alike.

Did it really exist or was it merely a myth resulting from a long chain of coincidence…? Who was to blame for placing it in the first place…? What motive could the curse placer have had…? Which new and exciting way would the next semi-incompetent defence professor meet their untimely end to teaching…?

But perhaps the most difficult question to answer about the so-called curse was, HOW? What was the true nature of the elusive ‘curse’, and HOW could it ever be broken? It was a question that had defied all speculation and remained unanswered for decades. And sadly, the mystery was unlikely to be solved any time soon… especially not by four inexperienced first years working entirely on their own, no matter how determined they were.

“So we’ve been through nearly every bad-luck charm under the sun, the ‘anti-felix-felicis’ potion and practically every other potion with similar effects, most individual curses that can cause long term reputation damage, madness and/or death-,” Theo wearily began to recite.

“Including the unforgivables and their variations,” Neville added queasily, no doubt thinking back to the awful book on the subject from the restricted section Madam Pince had let them peek at under her strict supervision. Poor Neville had had nightmares for a WEEK.

“-thank you Neville, beasts that could repeatedly cause such effects to happen and that could be feasibly trained to carry them out unseen,” Theo continued, eyes scanning down the lengthy scroll of parchment they’d accumulated. “Hauntings, poltergeist hauntings, cursed objects of various sorts-,”

“I still think that’s the most likely cause, for the record,” Sophie gingerly interrupted, raising her hand out of habit. “Just because we couldn’t find a suspicious object or rune sequence in the defence classroom or Professor Quirrell’s office doesn’t mean there mightn’t be one in his designated private quarters or another place linked to his particular professorship,”

“-thank you Sophie, but it’s not like we can investigate in there. Quirrell is way too paranoid to let students anywhere near his rooms,” Theo sighed wearily. “…okay, what else… right, name and place curses and associated taboos, but we can’t exactly check to see if the Dark Lord somehow managed to tie something into the Hogwarts ward array or even Britain’s nation-wide wards during the war…,”

Theo trailed off with another deep sigh.

“Spy in the unspeakables or not, I think either Professor Dumbledore or the ministry would have noticed something as overt as that,” Harry murmured, rubbing at his sore eyes. “Taboos aren’t exactly subtle. Can anyone think of anything we haven’t researched yet?”

There was a chorus of tired ‘no’s, ‘nope’s and ‘uh-uh’s from around their little table in the library in response and Harry fought the urge to groan. It was nearing the end of January now, and once Neville and Theo had returned to school they’d all been investigating the DADA curse near non-stop in between their increasing loads of homework.

It was becoming pretty clear they were exhausting their options, which meant that either the Dark Lord had created an entirely new brand of magic to enforce this curse (which considering some of the tales Harry had heard in the tower about Him, wasn’t entirely unfeasible) or He’d done something that they’d researched already and had hidden it in a way they’d missed.

They’d been at this for nearly three months now and their motivation was starting to wane… especially considering that Harry hadn’t had any more ‘episodes’ since Halloween. Not so much as a twinge in his scar had presented itself since that day, for which he was both thankful and frustrated.

(Thankful because it hadn’t happened again, but frustrated as it meant he couldn’t be SURE of it never happening again! Occasional pains were one thing, but when combined with a particularly bad day or the wrong memory recalled at the wrong time…)

“Maybe we should put researching the curse on the backburner for now,” Sophie hesitantly suggested, garnering three near-identical looks of confusion at her muggle phrasing. “I mean, put it aside for now. Maybe for a few weeks just to get ourselves back on track? I think we’ve hit a dead end,”

“As much as I don’t want to admit it, I think you’re right Sophie,” Harry resignedly admitted, palming his forehead as he felt an entirely natural headache start to come on. “We’ve probably gone through everything the school library has to offer us,”

“Are you certain Harry?” Theo asked concernedly, reluctantly looking down at their sheet of findings yet again. “If you have another fit then…,”

“But he hasn’t,” Neville murmured reassuringly to the Slytherin sitting across from him. “Not since Halloween. If Harry thinks we’re safe to step back from researching a bit, then it’ll probably be good to take a break… So long as you tell us straight away if anything flares up again, right Harry?”

Faced with the three equally earnest looks of worry being pointed in his direction, Harry had little choice but to promise them all that he would.

(Neville in particular could have probably weaponised those puppy eyes)

\-------

Harry couldn’t sleep.

It had been nearly a week since the Quiet Ones had unanimously agreed to put their investigation of the DADA curse on hold, and he’d been having difficulty resting at night ever since.

Like many children his age, Harry Potter HATED leaving problems half-solved, and his inability to figure out the mystery of the defence curse (and thus, its connection to presumably making his scar hurt on two particular occasions) had been preying on his mind.

This was worse than his usual insomnia. He’d tried reading himself to exhaustion, he’d tried his long worn meditation and occlumency exercises to clear his mind before bed, he’d tried his usually fool-proof tactic of chewing on one of his beloved dried cherries in order to drift off… But his constantly swirling thoughts on the matter of the curse had prevented him from dozing time and again.

The other Quiet Ones had noticed of course, seeing the increasing shadows beneath his eyes slowly growing to resemble how he’d looked straight out of Azkaban, and had set to trying to distract him… with varying levels of success.

Sophie’s stubborn ongoing attempts to learn parseltongue from him had been entertaining, if not very productive-

(-one Draco Malfoy, as always flanked by his two bodyguards, had attempted to approach their table during one such lesson over the past week for some unknown reason, and had sprinted off all but screaming as soon as he’d heard Sophie’s butchered attempt at a parseltongue ‘ _good afternoon_ ’. Theo had nearly suffocated from laughter-)

-Neville’s efforts to have them discover every secret passage in the castle had been welcomingly distracting until the duties of homework dragged them away once more-

(-they’d run into the Weasley twins more than once on these little excursions into the hidden passageways and staircases that honeycombed Hogwarts, and the pranksters had been surprisingly helpful towards their efforts… or at least until they’d ‘accidentally’  almost trapped them in the forbidden third floor corridor with Filch on the way. They’d avoided discovery and detention by a hair’s breadth-)

-and Theo’s ever amusing struggles to draw up a proper study schedule for the upcoming Easter holidays (and thus their final exams that would be held shortly afterwards) had actually managed to drag Harry’s attention away from the DADA problem for almost an entire day… if only because his initial three drafts would have required some kind of time travel for them all to follow accurately.

(Theo had eventually, reluctantly, admitted that he’d been inspired by one Hermione Granger of Gryffindor, whom had been loudly trying to rope her less studious friend Lavender Brown into a similar timetable at the library table next to them for the last few days in a row. It was still months until the final exams, but hearing others stress about it was starting to make HIM stress)

They’d even dragged him to go out flying as a group once or twice (even the less than enthusiastic Theo and Neville!) under Professor Flitwick’s watchful eye, in another well-thought out, if ultimately fruitless, plot to get Harry’s mind off the curse for good. He’d let them all have turns on his Nimbus 2000 so they didn’t have to stick with their borrowed school brooms ALL the time, and it had turned out that Theo was actually quite good in the air if he was flying on something of sufficient quality… but poor, queasy Neville clearly preferred to keep his feet firmly on the ground, shiny new broom or no.

Harry smiled a little to himself at the memories, before his brow crinkled again in frustration. He didn’t exactly have any of his friends here to distract him now, in bed at- he glanced at the dorm clock over the door between his curtains- eleven PM.

The rest of his dorm mates were sleeping peacefully, their bed curtains drawn and the alternating sounds of soft breathing or snores coming from within.

He sighed deeply and shut his eyes fruitlessly.

If only he could just take a stroll around the castle, just like he used to pace up and down the staircase in the northern tower when he couldn’t sleep… simply walking until his thoughts calmed down and could return to bed…

And that’s when Harry’s eyes flashed open with sudden realisation.

He COULD do that now.

After all, he’d already tried practically everything else… and hadn’t he promised himself that The Invisibility Cloak would only be used for insomnia emergencies?

\-------

The halls of Hogwarts were different at night.

Very few of the usual torches and lamps that brightened the corridors after dinner remained lit, casting once familiar areas into deep shadow. It was colder than usual, with an icy breeze occasionally blowing in through an open window or down a staircase. There was nobody around, no students chattering or the rumble of hundreds of feet going from place to place… only the occasional distant footsteps of a patrolling professor or prefect that Harry diligently avoided.

Invisibility Cloak or not, he wasn’t going to risk running into anyone at this time of night.

The Cloak seemed to swallow him up, made to be worn by someone at least twice Harry’s height, but it never impeded his feet or snagged around his ankles. It flowed like water around him as he glided down the silent hallways, its odd magical aura obscuring even the usual buzz of Hogwart’s ever-present wards in his ears, attuned to him in a way that even his wand never really was.

It was… peaceful, in a way, wandering the hallways alone and invisible at night, and if Harry’s nerves weren’t prickling with the thrill that he might be caught any minute then he probably would have been well and ready to get back to bed by now.

(Next time, Harry resolved, he’d just take the cloak down to pace the common room or something instead of sneaking out into the halls. There was too much anxiety involved with breaking curfew for his pacing to be truly relaxing… and worse, he’d just realised he’d mistakenly left his wand behind in the box Neville had given him for Christmas. Hopefully he didn’t run into Peeves…)

Harry let his socked feet take him wherever they wandered, and tried to drown out his worries by examining his surroundings in a way he never could while rushing to class or while exploring in the company of his friends.

The portraits all appeared to be asleep, and even the occasional statue seemed to have its head bowed in a doze. The numerous tapestries and works of art and other dilapidated pieces of finery scattered throughout the school popped out against Harry’s senses now there wasn’t crowds of young witches and wizards to distract him from their presence.

How long ago had these items been placed here? Harry found himself wondering. Which ones, if any, dated back to the founding of the castle and which came later? Who painted these paintings? Who chiselled those carvings in the walls? Who made these statues? Who wore those suits of armour? Who-?

It was as Harry was passing by one of those said suits of armour that he felt it, and all of his curious thoughts came to an unceremonious halt.

It was… a pull.

…it tickled against his sensitivity to magic unlike anything else in Hogwarts castle ever had before, reaching out to him with ribbon-like tendrils that could easily solidify into dense chains should they happen to snare him.

He froze, heart pounding in his ears, and his first real thought was:

‘This is bad’

But the thought faded almost immediately as Harry unconsciously took a step towards the unobtrusive door left ajar next to the suit of armour.

The pull wrapped itself around him, and all but dragged him inside.

\-------

A few floors away from Harry, a massive three headed dog snored thunderously away in complete discordance with the delicate tune the charmed harp beside it was gently playing.

The open trapdoor to one side of the beast shone with a bright yellow light; an enchanted lamp casting a bright glow around the room below and pushing the writhing tendrils of devil’s snare away into the darkest corners.

Down the hallway, a room full of flying keys remained visibly untouched… but for one fitted into the keyhole of next door with a transfigured rock wrapped in a stony rope around its wings.

The massive chessboard beyond that door looked similarly untouched, but if examined closely you could see a fine spray of sandy powdered marble littering the checkered ground- and slightly more obviously, one or two of the pawns were reattaching the last of their limbs after a hard fought match.

The troll in the room behind the chessboard merely lay stunned on the floor.

And concealed by a ward of flames behind that troll…

“Oh you have got to be JOKING…,” Voldemort hissed wearily, reading the roll of paper that Quirrell was awkwardly holding up to the face on the back of his head. “A logic puzzle, really?”

“T-these tasks do appear to be rather simple for a wizard of your brilliance m-my lord,” Quirrell stuttered nervously as he eyed the wide selection of potions on the bench. “Perhaps Dumbledore was expecting someone e-else to come after the stone?”

“Perhaps…,” Voldemort murmured with a creased frown. “…or there is some other plan of his afoot. This has all been far too easy; even a child could have made it this far with sufficient determination, perhaps aside from the dog and the troll… besides, I REFUSE to believe that Severus Snape would craft such an easy to circumvent obstacle without some kind of ulterior motive,”

“D-do you think he suspects-?!” Quirrell began to ask in horror.

“No,” Voldemort flatly cut his terrified host off before he could succumb to a panic attack. “We have managed to avoid the headmaster’s attention thus far, of this I am certain. No thanks to you,”

Quirrell winced at this, shaking hands lowering the puzzle scroll.

For a moment, Voldemort gazed over at the black flames blocking their way forward. It was difficult to truly see what lay beyond them, but for all purposes the final room appeared to be empty. Was this gauntlet all a ruse to distract overly-curious students from the real treasure, perhaps hidden completely elsewhere in the castle? If it were to waylay a potential thief, surely the obstacles would have been a little more challenging …

…but then again, Voldemort reluctantly admitted to himself, these childish distractions HAD actually managed to delay him for a number of months. Even if the three headed guard dog at the first door had been the only obstacle that had taken an extended amount of time for them to circumvent.

Something here was not right.

For months already, Voldemort had felt something was… off about this whole situation. Since Halloween especially, his metaphorical hackles had been raised for no apparent reason, other than some gut feeling that things were ‘going too well’. Miraculously staying out of Dumbledore’s suspicion (despite Quirrell’s constant near-fumbles), getting into the gauntlet without detection time and again, coaxing Hagrid’s secrets from him while under the influence of ‘Christmas spirits’…

Even his possession of Quirrell had remained remarkably stable all this time. In fact, his own projected timeline had predicted they’d need to start hunting unicorns by now in order to preserve the integrity of his host’s body and yet… the need simply hadn’t arisen. Somehow, his presence wasn’t causing Quirrell’s body to rot at the same rate it had lesser animals…

(Flashes of green and silver still occasionally darted across his vision… It was getting harder and harder to ignore…)

Voldemort sighed irritably.

“Quirrell, take the potion from the rounded bottle at the end of the line and go back the way we came,” he briskly ordered, cutting off Quirrell’s immediate stammered question with: “Lack of alarms thus far aside, if we enter the final chamber now Dumbledore will almost certainly be alerted. I don’t want to risk that before we know EXACTLY what is going on,”

Giving a queasy nod, Quirrell gingerly wrapped his turban back over his master’s face and took a sip of the directed potion. It would take them a while to get out of here after all, and they couldn’t risk running into another teacher in an… underdressed state.

… and besides, they had some evidence of their presence to erase on their way back too.

\-------

The empty classroom the pull called Harry into looked like it hadn’t been in use in many years, possibly forgotten even by the house elves judging by the state of the dusty furniture within…

…and then there was the mirror.

Completely out of place in the otherwise decrepit, forgotten classroom, the ornate free standing mirror in the centre of the room seemed to radiate enchantment. Its very presence was a silent invitation to come investigate, to come solve the mystery of its existence here…

(Vaguely, in the back of his thoughts, Harry could tell that the pull he felt was emanating from said mirror. His waking mind however, was too enthralled to do anything meaningful with this information)

_Come and look_ , the mirror seemed to whisper to him, _come and see…_

And so Harry did, slipping the invisibility cloak from his shoulders in a near trance like motion and coming to stand before the looking glass.

…

…He blinked.

…

…He stared.

…

…He couldn’t look away…

“Harry?” a curious old voice asked from out of nowhere, and Harry jumped back from the mirror with prejudice, whirling around to look at the formerly empty room.

Emerging out of the shadows with an odd expression on his face was none other than Professor Dumbledore, bright robes for once replaced with a relatively neutral yellow dressing gown. It was the first time Harry had been in such close proximity to the old wizard since he’d left Azkaban, and again, a small hysterical part of his mind screamed at him that running into the headmaster while out after curfew was far from the best second impression he could have made.

Professor Dumbledore looked vaguely confused for a moment, as if he expected to find someone else in this room, but then he smiled gently down at Harry.

“What are you doing out of bed so late at night my boy?” he asked with a quirked eyebrow.

Harry felt himself flush red, and forced himself not to turn back to look at the mirror.

“I… I couldn’t sleep headmaster,” Harry murmured awkwardly, glad that the professor no longer seemed to flinch at the rasp in his voice. “I was just walking about when…,”

Unintentionally, Harry’s gaze drifted back to the reflection next to him, and a look of understanding crossed Dumbledore’s face.

“Ah… the Mirror of Erised called to you then?” the headmaster said sympathetically. “I’m afraid that my plans to move it to a different location were slightly… delayed. It is not an object to be trifled with,”

“Then why is it here?” Harry asked confusedly as he continued to look into the mirror, his bluntness making the headmaster visibly wince.

“I suppose I had hoped that someone in particular would find it before any student would,” Professor Dumbledore said carefully. “There is currently another rare item hidden on the school grounds that many wizards would gladly steal had they the opportunity… a mirror that reveals one’s greatest desire would be an ideal tool to reveal the identity of such would-be thieves, wouldn’t you agree?”

At the headmaster’s words, Harry felt the pull he’d been ignoring suddenly go taut… and snap. His long still limbs suddenly felt stiff and noticeably achy, and he abruptly realised that he’d been standing motionlessly in front of the looking glass for longer- far, FAR longer- than he’d thought. Blinking rapidly, Harry took a few hasty steps away from the clearly dangerous mirror as the tendrils of magic that had snared him began to almost visibly to cast about for another victim.

One’s greatest desire… well, at least the headmaster seemed to be somewhat immune to the pull as Harry now was. Perhaps knowing the true purpose of the artefact gave you an advantage in resisting it? Who knows how long he might have stood there and stared otherwise…? Harry shivered, and not entirely from the cold

“I’m sorry for being out of bed so late professor,” Harry quickly apologised, deliberately not responding to the headmaster’s vaguely ominous question. “I should get back to my house tower,”

“Of course Harry, no harm done,” Professor Dumbledore smiled, thankfully seeming disinclined to deal out a detention or point loss for Harry’s breach of curfew. “I will move the mirror post-haste. It appears that whoever I hoped would find it is looking elsewhere, and if a student was called to it instead… well, I’m sure other innocents will soon follow. Others who might not be so easily pulled away from what they see,”

“Thank you professor,” Harry said politely, swinging The Invisibility Cloak around his shoulders without thinking- he froze- and then noted that the professor didn’t seem surprised by his possession of such an item.

Huh… That was… suspicious. But, Harry thought, it could also wait until tomorrow.

(Who knew how many minutes- hours- he’d already lost of sleep during his enthrallment in the image in the mirror?)

He turned to leave the classroom and the looking glass behind, but the headmaster spoke one last time before he could exit the room.

“Whenever I look in this mirror, I find myself holding a pair of thick, woollen socks,” the headmaster said softly, his voice laced with something like regret.

Harry paused by the doorway. The headmaster’s words were a blatant invitation. He wanted to know what Harry had seen… but how could he explain…?

Turning back one final time, he saw Professor Dumbledore had his back to him, looking into the mirror with a pensive expression that suggested connotations far beyond a simple pair of socks.

And in the mirror’s surface beyond…

…

In the end, it was a laughably simple image, the descriptor of an impossible idea that Harry had long resigned to never becoming reality.

There was a table, reminiscent of one of the Hogwarts library tables, set with a chessboard alongside a number of curious books and trinkets.

In one of the two comfy chairs that bookended the table sat an image of the very man that stood before Harry, Albus Dumbledore himself. The reflection’s eyes silently twinkled with mirth and his blindingly white robes brushed along the table edge as he moved an opening piece.

And in the other chair sat a figure that Harry had never seen before. Cloaked in black and with a hood pulled down over his face, all that Harry could truly see of him were two blood red eyes nearly glowing through the darkness… and perhaps, that was all the mirror suspected he needed to identify the stranger.

The Dark Lord… or someone else like him.

It was a simple image, and yet it said so much.

For there were no wands in that reflection. No spells flying, no followers raging at each other, no death or blood or curses or orphans left behind. Just two men, one in white, one in black, sitting on opposite sides of a chessboard… and doing nothing but amiably playing chess.

“I see… reason, professor,” Harry said quietly, ripping his gaze from the impossible image. “I see peace,”

And with that, he flipped up the hood of his cloak and left before the headmaster could say another word.

Reason. Peace.

He scrubbed his watering eyes and forced himself to make the trek back to Ravenclaw tower. He needed his sleep.

_It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live._

\-------

Lord Voldemort, once again piggybacking off of Quirrell’s senses, silently cancelled his supersensory charm as the invisible footsteps faded away down the opposite corridor, leaving Dumbledore behind in the room with-

-with the mirror.

This was… not good.

Well, on one hand he supposed it fortunate that they’d been passing back though this particular corridor when they’d heard Dumbledore’s voice but this…

The Mirror of Erised, of all things? Voldemort had only ever read vague accounts of such a kind of magical mirror, but he knew enough to understand that facing it unprepared would be disastrous for anyone. Perhaps ESPECIALLY in his and Quirrell’s case, considering what their ‘greatest desires’ were at this current point in time.

And Dumbledore had said the mirror was to be moved… A vision of the empty room beyond the flames in the potions puzzle room flickered across his mind’s eye…

This was it. THIS was the final trap of the gauntlet; one that Voldemort had only escaped because the bloody headmaster had removed it from the third floor on a whim that he might tempt the thief out into the open.

Had the Mirror of Erised been in its proper place… well, no doubt that after passing the potion logic puzzle, either one or (Merlin forbid) BOTH of them would have been enthralled by their illusory reflection, the stone so close and yet out of reach… and thus disabled when the alarms were silently raised and the professors all came flooding in to surround them.

Voldemort repressed a shudder at the thought, knowing it would only panic his already terrified vessel further.

Tonight had been close. WAY too close. And worse, if Dumbledore had hidden the philosopher’s stone in the way he suspected, then Voldemort had no real idea of how to bypass or neutralise an artefact such as the Mirror of Erised… or at least, not yet.

And he supposed that was the limited ‘bright side’ of this whole fiasco. They now KNEW what they would be facing, and could conduct appropriate research to counter it. It may take time, but in the end Lord Voldemort WOULD prevail.

So he WOULD calm down, and he WOULD think rationally.

…

Almost involuntarily, at this thought Voldemort turned his gaze down the hall in which the invisible Harry Potter had retreated. Strange that the boy had been wandering about tonight of all nights…

_Reason. Peace._

_(Green and silver and silver and green)_

And as it had so many times before across his clouded mind in the past few months, an epiphany occurred to Voldemort.

A horrifying epiphany… but not about the stone, or Dumbledore, or any of the ludicrous traps that had been laid for him and his followers around the school.

No… he had just realised a truth, an awful truth, about the nagging mystery of the boy-who-had-lived-through-nine-years-of-Azkaban.

…Voldemort, valiantly, repressed the urge to scream.

\-------

“I am two in the morning, two in noon and one in the night. But I am nothing in midday. What am I?” the doorknocker to Ravenclaw tower asked.

…

Crud, Harry thought. He knew he’d forgotten something.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your comments and kudos!
> 
> Please don't be too harsh on poor Remus for ignoring Sirius's letters; he actually has a very reasonable excuse for doing so! A reason that may or may not have something to do with a certain rat they both despise... (and beyond saying that, too many spoilers!) As for a visibly unhappy dementor, I've always imagined it as them getting even creepier, shadowier and loom-ier (is that a word?), their own distaste at whatever situation happens to be displeasing them leaking into the air and further terrifying anybody in their immediate vicinity.
> 
> To explain what Harry sees in the Mirror of Erised, the simple answer is indeed 'reason and peace' as he told Dumbledore. Harry's greatest desire, having grown up in Azkaban in between two highly polarized ethical viewpoints, is for everyone he loves to all be able to simply get along. Seeing the respective leaders of the 'Light' and 'Dark' simply peaceably playing chess together rather than trying to kill each other is symbolic of this seemingly impossible scenario Harry desires, and just as unlikely to occur... or is it?  
> Yes, Voldemort has finally realised something important about Harry, and yes, it is related to the dementor immunity question! Hopefully, due to his tendency to monologue, he'll share this epiphany with the rest of us say... next chapter? (Look forward to it!)  
> The answer to the riddle in this chapter is, 'the letter n'.
> 
> Next time: A long awaited confrontation... or, Harry thought his days of listening to evil monologues were over damn it!


	16. A Long Awaited Confrontation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry is subjected to an unwanted monologue... that none the less reveals some important truths.

It started out exactly like an ordinary day.

It was getting towards the end of February, the snow was finally melting and the sun was rising earlier and earlier every morning.

The school term was in full swing, with the holidays a respectable distance away and exams but a distant thought in the future to all but the nigh-panicking OWL and NEWT students.

Classes had ended, it was a Friday, there was much rejoicing etcetera etcetera… Harry Potter, as per usual, had joined the Quiet Ones in the library that afternoon to get a head start on the week’s homework, so that they might have some time to spare during the weekend itself for a little more castle exploring at Neville’s behest.

(They hadn’t yet returned to their DADA curse research, and as a whole they were generally resigned to the fact that it would likely be, as Sophie had put it, ‘on the backburner’ until some better evidence fell into their laps)

They all had sat at the Gryffindor table for dinner that night, where Theo dutifully ignored the glares he was getting from the eldest and youngest Weasley’s in attendance-

(-the twins, as always, seemed unnaturally delighted to see them-)

-Sophie continued to mangle several parseltongue phrases under Harry’s amused guidance-

(-she’d been getting an increasing number of wary looks over the past few months from certain nosy eavesdroppers, yet oddly enough the fact that Harry was the true parselmouth in their group had escaped the rumour mill’s attention-)

-and Neville added some last few lines of text to his herbology homework in between bites of lasagne (much to Hermione Granger’s alarm down the table, whom hadn’t even started on their questions about fanged geraniums yet).

They all left the great hall just after dessert had been served, and Harry parted ways from his friends feeling full, sleepy and content.

All in all, it had been a normal day. A good day in fact, one which Harry had been gladly prepared to end by arguing with his common room doorknocker, taking a long, steaming hot shower and then reading the last act of Macbeth before curfew came into force.

…

But he never got as far as the Ravenclaw tower stairs.

\-------

The desserts were just being cleared down in the great hall when a silent alarm went off through the wards, ‘pinging’ directly into the headmaster’s mind.

Many of the more studious (or simply more tired) students had already departed the hall for bed, as had several of the professors, making the apparent culprit hard to immediately identify.

Calmly, Albus Dumbledore left his half-finished slice of trifle behind on his plate, exited the great hall through the side door next to the staff table, and immediately called for Fawkes.

The phoenix (thankfully in between burning days, or else the headmaster’s plan may have hit a snag) obligingly transported his chosen wizard directly to his desired location… that being a certain dead end room within the gauntlet on the forbidden third floor corridor.

Wand at the ready and wreathed in residual phoenix fire, Albus Dumbledore stepped forward to confront the elusive thief he’d been pursuing all year… only to emerge into an empty room, with naught but a shattered mirror standing within.

The crimson stone, which rightly should have been broken with the mirror under such a base assault, was missing.

The mystery thief, against all odds, had conquered the mirror of Erised and taken the Philosopher's Stone.

And had vanished.

\-------

An emergency staff meeting was called.

It didn’t take long for the astounded professors to realise that poor, stuttering Professor Quirrell was the only individual unaccounted for.

There was no sign of passage through Hogwarts’ exterior wards however, so a desperate search commenced throughout the castle while the students slept.

…and once a Ravenclaw prefect reported from their nine PM bed check that Harry Potter’s four poster was empty, the search only became more frantic.

\-------

Harry awoke to

PAIN.

-blood was boiling inside his veins- his bones were all splintering into pieces- the winding scars up his arms were splitting open and spilling his flesh onto the floor- his head felt as though there was a dementor, eyeless and rattling bearing down upon-

He wasn’t even aware he was screaming until the pain abruptly stopped, leaving him gasping for breath, slumped boneless and weak against the pillar where he’d been bound.

Mind foggy with both the residual pain and the disorientation of a sudden awakening, Harry blearily opened his eyes, taking in the dimly lit chamber that surrounded him. There was an odd, greenish kind of glow to the air, emanating from somewhere high above, but it was not enough to truly illuminate the area. There were columns lining the room- or at least as far as his blurry eyes could see- and there were vaguely serpentine shapes carved into the walls, the floor, the pillars-

Harry took a deep, shuddering breath and shut his eyes again.

Well, at least it wasn’t Azkaban…? But that was a vanishingly small comfort, seeing as he had absolutely no idea where he was.

Getting his trembling feet back under him with some difficulty, Harry gently tugged at his restraints. They appeared to be ropes of some sort, wrapped tightly around his arms and forcing them behind his back, alongside further sturdy coils around his chest and waist securing him upright against the column-

“Harry Potter…,” a high, rasping voice interrupted Harry’s increasingly panicky analysis of his current situation.

His eyes shot open once more, finally taking in the shadowed figure standing across from him.

Bald headed and without his turban, it took Harry several seconds to recognise him.

“Professor… Quirrell?” Harry gaped, his teacher’s familiar figure shrouded by the half-light.

It took a further moment, but then Harry’s memories came rushing back to him. He’d just separated from Neville on the steps up to Gryffindor tower… He’d passed Professor Quirrell by the third floor… The teacher had unexpectedly started up some small talk about being a Ravenclaw alumnus himself, commiserating with Harry about the stubborn doorknocker… Delighted at the chance to perhaps finally gain some more insight into the DADA curse (or if not, at least a way to potentially bypass the endless riddles) Harry had happily followed the professor blindly as they’d chattered…

…there’d been a flash of red light…

And then Harry had woken up here, wherever ‘here’ was.

Oh bloody hell.

“What happened to your voice?” was the question, out of millions of presumably better options, that immediately fell out of Harry’s mouth once his tongue began to work again.

“…is that really the first question that comes to your mind?” Professor Quirrell asked dryly, toying with his wand… and then Harry realised that the professor’s mouth wasn’t moving with those words.

And that it WASN’T HIS VOICE.

He swallowed, HARD, eyes quickly scanning what he could see of the room once more to see if there was anyone else who could have spoken.

…but there was no one.

Professor… Quirrell (?) took a step towards Harry, and he immediately felt himself tense in response. His eyes were now glued to the wand in the older man’s hands, and his mouth was dry at the memory of the awful pain he had woken up in.

_-‘Now before your godfather tries to gut me in retaliation, I’m not actually going to TEACH you any of these curses,’ Rabastan Lestrange had started out defensively at the beginning of their spell theory lesson, which was never a good sign. ‘But the fact is that you NEED TO KNOW that they exist. Heck, even the Hogwarts board agreed with that back in my days at school...,’_

_Rabastan had trailed off thoughtfully for a minute, before shaking his head and returning his attention to Harry._

_‘There are three curses out of all those on record that are punished VERY harshly by the ministry, commonly known as the unforgivable curses,’ he’d begun to explain. ‘Now, the Avada Kedavra curse is probably better explained by Antonin or Raleigh, but it does what it’s called. The killing curse kills. No fuss, no muss, no blood and guts spilling everywhere, but it requires pure. Killing. Intent. In order for it to work. It’s green in colour when cast correctly, it’s believed to either stop all brain function and/or cut the soul off from the body depending on which literature you read, and you’re probably the only known person in history to have ever survived a direct hit with it,’_

_Nine year old Harry had gulped audibly at this, but allowed Rabastan to continue his lecture uninterrupted._

_‘Now the Imperius Curse, or Imperio as the incantation is called, is also known as the controlling curse,’ Rabastan went on. ‘It’s comparatively easy to cast, invisible to the naked eye, tricky to maintain and VERY tricky to resist… but at least resisting it is possible, unlike the other two. The Imperius basically turns people into puppets of the caster with no will of their own, but if the victims been dosed with certain potions, or have been softened by legilimency… well, the results can vary. You should ask Florian about that one if you feel some morbid urge to know more,’_

_It was then that Rabastan got a rather uncomfortable look in his eye._

_‘And then there’s the… last unforgivable curse, which is probably the one I know best,’ Rabastan had reluctantly admitted. ‘Now, there are a lot of ways to cause people pain. Even if you disregard the million-and-a-half various different spells of that nature, there are still a whole lot of methods for torturing someone without using magic at all. But for the unskilled, the less creative or the time constrained, there’s-,’-_

“ _Crucio_ ,” not-Quirrell’s voice hissed, and a bloody red bolt of light shot from his wand to strike Harry’s immobile form.

And he SHRIEKED.

-he could feel his skin peeling away- _‘causes the brain’s pain centres to’-_ his ears bursting and pounding with senseless noise- _‘aftereffects include short term nerve tremors and phantom pains for up to’-_ the scar on his forehead splitting open- _‘madness, or simple catatonia if incorrectly’-_ make it stop-make it stop- _‘no physical signs of injury, making it hard to later detect’-_ makeitstop-makeitstop-stop-stop-stop-STOP-!

Once the curse ended (after a minute?-an hour?-an eternity?) Harry went silent and limp against the pillar once again, trying to get his breath back. Vaguely, he realised he was shaking uncontrollably, and there was a faint taste of bile at the back of his throat.

“Interesting…,” the not-Quirrell voice hissed. The professor raised his wand again and Harry couldn’t help but flinch, but instead of another Cruciatus a soft white beam of light enveloped him. It flowed over his body and flared around his head in a silvery halo, mussing his hair with an unseen breeze, before abruptly disappearing.

Confused, Harry took a risk and looked up at Professor Quirrell once again. His head was tilted to one side, face curious in expression but with his mouth firmly pinched shut. His eyes were… odd. The usual brown colour looked… tinted, in a way, though whether it was because of the strange lighting or some other reason, Harry couldn’t tell.

Besides, questions about the colour of Quirrell’s eyes were rapidly being displaced by the horrific realisation that his defence professor, his CURSED defence professor, had kidnapped him, taken him somewhere unknown and was in the process of torturing him.

…so Harry did the one thing he’d learnt to do in this kind of situation, countless times before.

He talked. If he could keep talking… and, more importantly, keep his captor talking for long enough…

“S-so…,” Harry began unsteadily, hating how his usually raspy voice sounded even harsher than normal, trembling with the aftereffects of unforgivable pain and continually interrupted by his heavy breaths. “…is this another consequence of the Defence Against the Dark Art’s curse…? Or have I just managed to… upset you in some other way?”

Quirrell just blinked at first, confusion plain upon his face. And then the high, rasping laughter started, making the man before Harry visibly flinch as the noise echoed around the chamber.

“M-master?” Quirrell asked tremulously, and this time it WAS Quirrell that spoke, his familiar stammering voice leaving his parted lips in a fearful manner.

“UPSET me, boy?” the voice queried amusedly, seemingly ignoring Quirrell’s question. “Oh… you have no idea,”

Quirrell suddenly straightened up then, face in an expression of rigid alarm.

“Turn around Quirrell,” the voice commanded. “Let him see my face…,”

“My l-l-lor- I mean, master, a-are you strong enough to-?” Quirrell started in alarm.

“I am strong enough for this…,” the voice cut him off, his last word trailing off into a startlingly familiar hiss that made Harry’s eyes widen.

For he knew that kind of accent, that tone… Aunt Bella had once taught him how to employ such a tone himself, for scaring off ‘overly interested purebloods’. An emphasis, she’d said, that displayed the speaker’s abilities as a parselmouth without devolving into the language itself. An emphasis quite unlike the rasp of Harry’s normal voice, which remained a pale imitation of this intimidating, roiling hiss…

And as Quirrell slowly, reluctantly turned around, Harry only barely noticed the sudden throbbing pain in the scar on his forehead, so mild in comparison to the Cruciatus he’d recently suffered that it seemed like the mildest tickle against his senses.

…

But it was enough. Enough to trigger the horrified realisation that THIS was what had triggered his memory-aided fit on Halloween. Not the mysterious DADA curse, as he’d researched with his friends. Not some secret dementor hiding in the supply closet, as his irrational thoughts had first suggested. Not even an exaggerated fear crafted by his own imagination, as he’d been starting to worry as time had gone on with no more of the strange pains.

“We meet again, Harry Potter,” said the sneering face of Lord Voldemort on the back of Quirrell’s head.

\-------

Back in the northern tower, especially in the early days, Harry Potter had heard a LOT about you-know-who/Lord Voldemort/the Dark Lord.

His glory, His goals, His incredible powers… and of course, quite a lot of very explicit threats about what EXACTLY He would do to Harry upon his ‘inevitable return’.

Aunt Bella in particular, back when she’d been… less than stable… had been prone to going off on long, dreamy descriptions of the wizard she’d once called master, uncannily like a schoolgirl describing a crush.

_-‘Has your blood-traitor ever told you the muggle tale of Snow White?’ the heavy eyed, sharp toothed woman had crooned to him from the other side of the bars. ‘Skin as white as snow… Hair as black as ebony… Eyes as red as blood… Or was that lips, in the original tale? Pah- the muggle stories never get it right…,’-_

And now, even considering that the former object of Aunt Bella’s affections was currently ATTACHED TO THE BACK OF SOMEONE ELSE’S HEAD, Harry had to admit her descriptions still bore some accuracy.

Lord Voldemort’s skin was pale, far paler than Quirrell’s ruddy tan, and even in the half-light Harry could almost see the greenish, slowly decaying ‘seam’ where his face was attached to his host’s cranium. His red eyes practically glowed in the dark, as though carved from rubies with an onyx slit down the centre. His face seemed almost serpentine in appearance, with mere slits for a nose and almost scaly patterns over what served as his cheeks and jawbone.

There was little Harry could do but stare, frozen in not-quite-horror and not-quite-awe at the… thing he saw before him.

Remembering his dormant occlumency shields through the haze of panic, pain and confusion, for one split second Harry hesitated… and then slammed up his mental walls and brutally forced down his fear behind them. Knowing how’d they’d faltered under pressure on Halloween, Harry knew they probably wouldn’t hold for long now… but even a few scant minutes of clear thoughts in this situation would be better than nothing.

There were no encroaching, traumatic memories pressing behind his shields this time, but the sheer terror that he was forcing back instead was just as pressing, just as damaging… perhaps even worse than mere memory. But he simply couldn’t afford to just break down and panic. Not now. Not in a situation like this.

Already having gaped for far longer than he really should have, Harry did his best to swallow his remaining nerves, planted his feet steadily on the ground once more and looked up into Lord Voldemort’s bloodshot, ruby eyes.

“Well, that explains a lot,” Harry said nervously.

The Dark Lord’s thin-lipped mouth curled upwards in a vaguely amused smirk at Harry’s words, and even in the darkness he could plainly see the shudder that ran through Quirrell’s body at the action.

Merlin, the constant jitters in the hallways, refusing to turn his back on his students, the faint smell of rotting flesh whenever he passed too close… this really DID explain a lot about Quirrell’s behaviour this past term.

“You remain remarkably calm… seeing what I have become,” Voldemort half-whispered curiously. “Though I suppose with your odd… ability, that is no surprise,”

Harry swallowed uneasily. Ability? Did he mean Harry’s rather shoddy occlumency shields, which were already close to buckling under the weight of the sheer terror he was feeling at that moment? Surely THAT wasn’t what he was referring to… His status as a parselmouth? No, Harry had never spoken in the snake tongue in front of ANY teacher from Hogwarts, so Quirrell/Voldemort probably wasn’t even aware he possessed it unless they’d deduced it from his raspy voice… Perhaps he meant the strange way in which Harry could ‘sense’ magic…?

For a brief moment as that thought crossed his mind, Harry abruptly realised that the ever-present hum of Hogwarts’ familiar wards seemed to have vanished from said senses- (-his occlumency barred levels of alarm were starting to peak-) -and had been replaced with a sickly blanket of… something else, heavy in the air around them… And around the Dark Lord’s face on the back of Quirrell’s head in particular, if he focused.

Harry took a slow, deliberate breath and let it out again, trying NOT to think about the foreign magic (and hence, the fact that apparently he’d somehow been spirited outside of the Hogwarts wards and likely was far from any kind of rescue by the saner teachers) while desperately attempting to physically calm himself before his occlumency shields inevitably gave way and left him a blubbering, hysterical mess.

At least right now the Dark Lord seemed… well, ‘intrigued’ was probably not quite the right word, but it was the first that came to his mind… by Harry, in some way. But regardless, Harry knew that the moment that he broke and started to panic in earnest, Voldemort’s current interest in him was unlikely to hold and the torture would probably start up again.

…or something worse.

“I never really believed you’d died,” Harry kept talking, disregarding Voldemort’s strange remark about ‘odd abilities’ for the moment. “No one in the tower did. But I will admit I wasn’t… quite expecting something like this,”

Voldemort raised a bald eyebrow at this.

“Is that so?” he hissed out inquisitively. “Then I suppose the devotion of my followers in Azkaban has not waned as far as I’d feared… for leaving you alive for so many years,”

A twinge of indignation flared in Harry’s gut at these words even through his fear-strained mind shields. For all the inmates of the northern tower had… gotten used to Harry and Sirius over the years, he knew very well that their loyalty to the Dark Lord had not waned a single instant. Very, VERY well.

The idea that Lord Voldemort was DOUBTING them just because Harry was still ALIVE…

“If it makes any difference to you, Aunt Bella did try to kill me on nineteen different occasions before I turned six,” Harry said dryly. “The others barely even got a shot in for how fixated she got,”

“Oh?” the Dark Lord drawled amusedly, and Harry shut his mouth with an audible click as he realised just what familiar title he’d referred to one of Voldemort’s favoured ex-lieutenants with… the favoured ex-lieutenant that had innocently taught Harry how to imitate her long-lost master’s manner of speech, he slowly, queasily realised.

(Merlin, no WONDER none of the others had dared to explain to him why Bellatrix’s method to ‘scare off overly-interested purebloods’ had unnerved them so! Bloody hell…)

Fortunately, the Dark Lord took Harry’s silence as a cue to continue speaking rather than have Quirrell raise his wand once more.

“I will admit that I completely disregarded the mystery when I first heard the news of your… incarceration,” Voldemort pondered, Quirrell’s body starting to involuntarily pace in time with his words. “The fact that you survived so long in Azkaban not only intact mentally… but also while surrounded by followers of mine so loyal that they went to prison rather than denounce my name. Fanatical behaviour like that does not tend to… lend itself to restraint,”

“They all got more tolerable over time,” Harry shrugged as far as his ropes would allow, feeling the lingering trembles in his limbs from the last Cruciatus finally start to fade.

“Tolerable, you say?” Voldemort queried, tilting Quirrell’s head to one side. “Or, perhaps, more… reasonable?”

The emphasis he placed on that last word sounded somehow deliberate, and Harry found himself frowning oddly at the face plastered to the back of his DADA professor’s head.

“Have you never wondered, Harry Potter?” the Dark Lord asked probingly. “How you managed to survive so long in Azkaban? How you miraculously escaped both the famed mental drain of the dementors and the wrath of my most loyal…? Surely, at least, how the behaviour of the people around you changed the longer they spent in your presence…?”

“…you say that like you already know why,” Harry said carefully, trying not to let his curiosity get the better of him while his fearful emotions were supressed like they were.

Because of COURSE he’d wondered every now and then why dementors seemingly had no effect on him or those around him, why the inmates of the northern tower had warmed up to him so over time despite their almost-paradoxical continued devotion to their lord, why things had kept happening to him in the northern tower that had seemed beyond the bounds of everyday ‘accidental magic’-

( _-why the dementors only ever uselessly kissed his forehead when they could have easily stolen his soul-_ )

-but actively feeding into Voldemort’s almost-rehearsed sounding monologue would likely bring it to an end sooner… and thus hasten the approach of whatever final fate the Dark Lord had in mind for Harry. For his own sake, he needed to keep his captor talking for as long as he possibly could.

(Harry tried not to think about how no Uncle Padfoot was frantically searching for him this time. That this was not the relatively small northern tower with limited hiding places for his would-be rescuers to explore. That this was the Dark Lord himself and not one of his imprisoned, wandless, half-crazed Death Eaters from Harry’s earliest years…)

“And that brings us back to your odd… ability,” Voldemort purred knowingly. “An ability… that you appear to be unaware that you possess. I think it is only fair that I share my knowledge of it with you now, considering how it has helped me this past year… wouldn’t you agree?”

Suddenly, Quirrell’s arm waved his wand again, and Harry automatically flinched even as his body was bathed in the same mysterious, pearly glow as the last time.

But to his surprise, this time the face of Lord Voldemort lit up too, an ominous cloud of deep blue light surrounding his grafted expression (yet strangely enough, not any of the rest of Quirrell’s hijacked body) before it too disappeared alongside Harry’s silvery halo. It was unlike any spell he’d seen before, and he’d not heard an incantation- what did the coloured lights mean? What was that spell?

“I found that spell in an ancient tome, hidden deep within Salazar Slytherin’s Chamber of Secrets,” Voldemort softly proclaimed, as if having plucked the question directly from Harry’s mind. “It is an… imperfect charm, originally meant to detect the presence of magic in humans. I suspect it was crafted with the motive of detecting muggleborn wizards amidst their filthy kin. Alas, it only functions when there is ‘in-use’ magic around the target of the charm, such as a disillusionment, a boon, or a curse… or, in our cases, a passive aura,”

“An aura-?” Harry started to ask before he could stop himself, snapping his jaw shut as he realised just what he was doing. That was one of the downsides of keeping his fear trapped beneath his mental shields so primitively- it occasionally led to… inadvisable behaviour. Harry brutally supressed the memories that tried to flare up at that thought and swallowed down the remains of the question on his tongue.

The Dark Lord smirked amusedly at Harry’s rapidly paling face.

“Ever a Ravenclaw, even when in mortal peril,” Voldemort breathily chuckled. “I will spare you the fine details, but suffice to say that you possess a passive magical aura much like my own… one crafted in your early youth via accidental magic under great stress, I suspect. It is how mine formed after all…,”

Rather than elaborate, Voldemort ceased pacing with Quirrell’s feet and looked Harry right in the eye.

“It took me some time to discern the fact that you had an aura of this sort… let alone that it might have been the answer to the mystery of your survival in Azkaban,” Voldemort continued thoughtfully. “And even then, I did not quite believe it until I conducted my… examination of you this last hour. After all, a wizard or witch developing a passive aura is rare these days… But I digress… Suffice to say that wherever you go, whatever you do, a passive aura… surrounds you, every hour of the day. And it… influences the people who come into contact with it,”

Harry felt his heart practically leap into his throat. Influence…? What did he mean by that? The awful image of a some kind of passive Imperius curse, unconsciously forcing people to his will, briefly came to Harry’s mind…

“Now magical auras are relatively common in our world- though they are most often found around enchanted inanimate objects, and can only subtly encourage certain… base reactions towards the item, such as desire, curiosity or fear,” Voldemort lectured. “But a passive aura generated by a wizard or witch can project far more… complicated concepts, with a variety of effects. Like an aura of harmony… Or perhaps of disgust… Or of logic, of cunning, of hope or suspicion- these, and many other abstract concepts have been documented in Slytherin’s library as being the focus of passive auras in the past…,”

He trailed off, and like a bizarre marionette, Quirrell’s body walked backwards towards Harry until Lord Voldemort was looming over him, barely a step away. The throbbing pain in his forehead scar grew more and more intense the closer he came, a thin trickle of blood starting to ooze from the splitting mark, running down over his cheek. A hand, clearly under the Dark Lord’s control rather than his host’s, stretched awkwardly backwards to trail a few fingers down Harry’s face, making him shudder as it smeared through the blood trail and caught hold of a few loose strands of silver and black hair.

“But you, Harry Potter…,” Voldemort practically whispered in his ear. “I am sure of it now. You emanate REASON,”

With a sharp tug that made Harry yelp, Quirrell’s body stepped back with the strands of hair in hand. Voldemort examined them thoughtfully for a moment, but Harry didn’t dare speak. His terror was trying to climb its way over his occlumency walls like Mrs Norris trying to climb out of a running shower, and he feared that his firmly closed mouth was all that was keeping him from screaming aloud.

Being this close to Lord Voldemort invoked an almost unnatural fear in him that made it hard for Harry to think or breathe, let alone truly register the words that the Dark lord was now speaking.

“Reason and rationality… an odd kind of aura, but one that can permanently affect any living being you come into contact with,” the Dark Lord mused, rubbing Quirrell’s fingers over the silvery strands while discarding the natural black. “An aura, judging by the evidence I’ve seen, that primarily fights back madness, wilful idiocy, and both excessively negative and magically forced emotions… in both your own mind, and in those around you,”

“From what I’ve seen, a mind altering spell like the Cruciatus curse still hurts you… but it doesn’t significantly impair your mental faculties OR weaken the effect of your aura,” he continued thoughtfully. “Just as I hypothesise that a dementor could feasibly still physically chill you; even administer its kiss to you… but its shroud of despair wouldn’t take hold, nor could it leech your happy memories and drag you down into madness. You soothe the minds and clarify the thoughts of those around you simply by being in their presence… And this I can confirm merely by comparing my own behaviour from before you first set foot in Quirrell’s classroom to… afterwards,”

The man in question shuddered again at the mention of his name, but otherwise stayed silent.

Now that the Dark Lord was standing a little farther back, Harry found he could breathe easier and his racing heart had calmed somewhat. His occlumency shields were developing some nasty cracks by now, but he was composed enough to finally process all of this information.

All in all, this theory did make sense the way that the Dark Lord was explaining it, that Harry was simply projecting an aura like an enchanted object would-

(-a distant part of his mind thought that perhaps if Voldemort had taught Quirrell’s classes instead of his perpetually stammering host, it would have made for much higher quality lessons. The rest of his mind summarily told that part to shut up-)

-only it was keyed to the abstract notion of ‘reason’ rather than a base emotion like desire or fear… and to cement the idea, a number of supporting incidents for Voldemort’s words started to come to Harry’s mind the longer he thought about it.

Neville’s parents after all that time he spent in the Janus Thickey ward ( _‘Mum’s never done something like this before,’ ‘A great improvement over the last week, we think!’_ ), Professor Snape’s improved behaviour towards him after long lessons in the potions labs ( _‘Two points to Ravenclaw for rescuing your dunderhead classmates from a painful trip to the hospital wing,’_ )… even the way that his own friends had seemed to relax more and grow more confident after the months they’d all spent together, growing secure in their shared quietness rather than ashamed of it.

Reason. Peace.

Harry felt the strangest urge to start laughing hysterically.

“But unfortunately…,” Voldemort began again, dragging Harry’s mind back to the here and now. “Your useful little gift has caused me a few… problems. I know what becomes of those who linger too long within my own aura… and several of my most devoted followers have undoubtedly spent nearly a decade in the presence of yours. It raises questions on how… useful they might be to me while you still live. It is clear that they at least tolerate you… if not hold some misplaced loyalty for indirectly saving their sanity,”

At this, Harry felt his already tense body tense up even further. Oh no. This was not good. NOT GOOD.

“They are still loyal to you!” Harry blurted out hastily, eyes trained upon the wand still in Quirrell’s off hand. “I’ve lived with them my whole life, I KNOW them, and I know there’s no way they’d ever choose me over-,”

“Their chosen lord?” Voldemort cut him off with a twisted smile. “Perhaps not. But I do not like to take risks. You crippled me once Harry Potter, and even if I put the loyalty of my followers aside… I still cannot allow a threat like you to continue living when I have ample opportunity to end you once and for all,”

He made a sweeping gesture at the chamber around them with Quirrell’s hands, and the green light suddenly brightened marginally, revealing a massive statue at the end of the hall previously hidden in shadow. It was of a wizard in magnificent robes, its lined face cracked with age and appearing unflatteringly monkey-like in the half light. The same repeating motifs of snakes were carved into its stone raiment, and mossy water trickled down the granite folds into shallow pools on the sagging floor.

“Consider this information a final thank you, Harry Potter,” Voldemort hissed almost tenderly as he gazed up at the statue. “Now that I am aware of it… I am certain that without the aid of your peculiar aura I would never have come this far. I might have foolishly acquiesced to Quirrell’s schemes to kill you early in the year, and thus inadvertently revealed myself before accomplishing my goal. I might have fallen further into frustration and madness, allowing my current form to deteriorate before its time. I might never have even realised the full extent of the traps Dumbledore laid for me on the road to what I sought…,”

Quirrell’s other hand briefly touched a pocket of his robe at this, but Harry barely noticed through his ever increasing war between his panic and his occlumency shields.

“It seems fitting that it is here, in the Chamber of Secrets, my ancestor Salazar Slytherin’s final work at Hogwarts… that you will finally die. Goodbye, Harry Potter,” the Dark Lord concluded, before starting to hiss in the clear cadence of parseltongue. “ _Speak to me Sly-_ ,”

“WAIT!” Harry all but screamed, mind racing for a way to convince Voldemort to spare him, or failing that, a chance to distract him long enough to escape his bonds and make a break for it. The ropes however, seemed to tighten the more he struggled, leaving him only with the former option.

“If I’m going to die here, could you tell me something first?” Harry asked quickly, seeing that the Dark Lord’s patience was fraying fast. “You said you had an aura of your own. What is it?”

It was the first, silly question that came to Harry’s scrambling mind, and he could have kicked himself for it. But what else could he have asked that would have delayed Lord Voldemort even slightly?

Speaking of, the red eyed face smiled at him at the question. Actually smiled, not smirked or sneered or wrinkled his lips distastefully. The result was somehow more terrifying than any other expression that could have been on his snake-like visage at that moment.

…but, he answered, none the less.

“Awe, Harry Potter. My aura radiates awe,” Lord Voldemort said simply, that creepy smile widening on his bodiless face. “And it means that whether I am followed or hated… looked upon with fondness or suspicion… feared or even despised… it means no man or woman alive can ever dismiss me. But… I think that is enough delaying…? We have already stood here talking for far longer than is necessary,”

And, helpless to do anything but watch in horror, Harry looked on as Lord Voldemort called out to the statue against the far wall.

“ _Speak to me Slytherin, greatest of the Hogwarts four!_ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all again for your comments and kudos!
> 
> So Voldemort has finally decided to share his revelation about Harry! The idea of passive auras has been with me since the beginning of this story, and I'm glad that I can finally explain about them in more detail via evil-monologue. Even in cannon I've noticed Voldemort is quite partial to talking, even explaining complicated concepts or stories to his captive audiences; I think it might be an influence left over from his school teacher hopeful days :)  
> More details about passive auras will arise later on in the series, but what Voldemort has explained to Harry is (for the most part) correct. The situation that led to Harry developing his aura of reason (cough*Halloween*cough*dementors) probably isn't exactly what Voldemort guessed it was for one thing, so some of his guesses about what 'reason' is capable of are actually based off his own personal experience of 'awe'... and therefore might be proved inaccurate later on.  
> Sorry for the cliffhanger! I'll try to have the next update up on monday next week so you don't have to wait in suspense for too long.
> 
> Next time: The staff of Hogwarts panic... or, Harry meets the largest snake he's ever seen in his life!


	17. The Chamber of Secrets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry adds another tally to his worryingly high number of near-death experiences, and meets the largest snake he's ever seen in his life!

“How did we not SEE this?!” Severus Snape raged as he paced around the staff room. “Quirrell was ALWAYS disappearing on his night-time rounds, he was DELIBERATELY acting incompetent in his classes, and I swear at the Gryffindor-Slytherin quidditch match he was searching for someone to curse in the stands-!”

“Calm yourself Severus. He fooled us all,” Albus Dumbledore, calmly, interrupted his potions master’s fifth bout of such a rant in the last half-hour.

On the table before the headmaster sat a bowl of sherbet lemons that were most likely laced with some form of calming draught. After all, everyone still behaving even slightly reasonably in the tension-laden staff room at that moment had eaten at least one… Severus, quite clearly, had completely ignored the sweets.

“The aurors have been called,” Minerva McGonagall stiffly announced as she swept into the room, silencing both Severus’s ranting and the worried muttering of the rest of the staff instantly. “They’ve retrieved the file they compiled on Quirinus when he applied for the defence position, and a squad should be here within the hour to aid us in the search for him,”

“We’ve already searched EVERYWHERE!” Argus Filch, another one of those whom had turned down a lemony lolly, snarled from his corner of the room. “There’s nowhere he could have gone outside the school without tripping the exterior wards, as YOU told us headmaster-,”

Albus sighed wearily and pinched the bridge of his nose at the near-accusation, the twelfth of its kind he’d gotten within the last hour even after his offering of the debatably-laced candies.

“-and there’s not a single known room, corridor, secret passage or courtyard we’ve left unsearched!” Argus continued, throwing up his hands in exasperation. “Even Mrs Norris can’t track Quirrell and Potter’s scents further than the second floor girl’s bathroom, and bloody hell if I know where they went from there!”

“The portraits weren’t of much use either headmaster. Apparently a number of them ‘spontaneously’ fell asleep just before the theft,” Filius Flitwick said, calmly, TOO calmly, as he stirred a cup of tea in his customary seat at the table in a vaguely menacing manner. “Quirinus wouldn’t know the requisite charm to freeze Hogwarts bound paintings OR put them to sleep, I hope you’re aware. There is more at work here than just another cursed defence teacher going mad and kidnapping a student… One of MY students,”

“I am aware Filius,” Albus sighed again, too exhausted to properly appreciate the veiled threat his half-goblin charms professor was needling him with.

“Have the ghosts come up with anything yet?” Silvanus Kettleburn asked, calmly, drumming the fingers of his one remaining hand agitatedly on the table even through the enforced lemony tranquillity… which admittedly was the only thing keeping him from going out on a futile patrol of the forbidden forest ward line with Hagrid- the hysterical half-giant was admittedly much safer out there than the one-limbed wizard would be.

“The house ghosts said they’d report back here if they found anything,” Pomona Sprout, calmly, answered, eyes fixed on the clock on the wall. “All we can do is wait,”

The sentiment echoed around the increasingly tense room. Whether it was for the aurors, the ghosts to report, or even for the students to awaken in the morning faced with the news they would be confined to their common rooms until further notice… all anyone could do was wait.

\-------

Harry Potter, unsurprisingly, knew quite a bit about basilisks. Just as he did about ashwinders, and wyverns, and naga, and salamanders etcetera, etcetera… It was a hazard of having one Sophie Roper as a friend.

( _‘Basilisks are often called the king of serpents,’ Sophie had excitedly babbled over the lengthy entry related to the creature in ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’. ‘Look at the illustration! Have you ever seen such a beautiful creature before?’_

_Indeed, the colourful illustration (with a 1-inch to 1-foot scale clearly labelled beneath) of the emerald scaled, yellow eyed basilisk had soundlessly preened under Sophie’s honest flattery, twisting this way and that to show off its painted crimson plume and several sets of razor sharp fangs._

_Neville had gulped audibly and clutched Trevor (for once free of the Gryffindor dorms for the occasion) all the tighter in his hands, and Harry slowly put the chicken’s egg he’d snuck from the groundskeeper’s hens that morning back into his bag._

_‘…Sophie, with all due respect for your superior knowledge on reptiles and wider experience in the field,’ Theo had then dryly stated, saying what they were all thinking. ‘I think trying to actually hatch a basilisk might be slightly against school rules. And potentially fatal to us all, practical applications against Malfoy or no,’_

_And that had been the beginning, and the abrupt end, of their short lived scheme to acquire something venomous to potentially slip into Malfoy’s room. A baby basilisk, even Sophie sheepishly agreed in hindsight, would have been somewhat overkill anyway._

_…but the myriad of facts and trivia about basilisks that Sophie had expounded to them so enthusiastically, had remained stuck in Harry’s mind regardless_ )

So when Harry first caught a glimpse of glowing yellow… ringed by emerald green… stirring in the depths between the slowly opening stone lips of the massive statue at the end of the hall… at Voldemort’s hissed (parseltongue!) command… he knew to IMMEDIATELY slam his eyes shut.

(And he did so before even Quirrell did, as he gathered from Voldemort’s irritated English instruction ordering such a few moments later)

It was at this highly inconvenient moment that his increasingly frayed occlumency shields finally decided to unceremoniously give way, and every last second of the panic he’d been repressing while talking to the Dark Lord came rushing back at once.

Oh Merlin. Oh bloody hell.

He was in the Chamber of Secrets (which was WHERE exactly?!), a place only accessible by descendants of Salazar Slytherin himself if Voldemort’s proud undertones were anything to go by (which meant it was unlikely any rescue would arrive in the nick of time), with a basilisk bearing down on him that would likely be instructed to eat him in the next five minutes.

Harry was hyperventilating before he was even consciously aware of doing so, lights bursting behind his shut eyelids and his heart pounding frantically in his chest. He was panicking, and this time there were no traumatic encroaching memories to distract him from the horrible reality that was quickly coming to fruition around him.

Voldemort had seemingly well and truly finished with his monologue, and would be aware of any further attempts at stalling by his captive. Quirrell appeared utterly subservient towards (-and also quite reasonably terrified of-) his master, so there would be no help from there. And as for the basilisk its-(her?-he hadn’t seen a plume of any sort-)-self…

“ _Sssso hungry… for ssso long… hasss the Heir brought food?_ ” the deep, echoing hiss rattled through Harry’s bones themselves.

…well, hearing that, Harry suddenly wasn’t very confident of getting any sympathy there either.

“ _I have a gift for you, basilisk of Hogwarts_ ,” Voldemort’s parseltongue words echoed through the chamber, and a cold sweat broke out on Harry’s skin. “ _An enemy of Hogwarts that you may eat to slake your hunger_ ,”

With a great THUD the massive bulk of the basilisk must have hit the stone floor, causing the flagstones under Harry’s feet to vibrate with the force.

A brief thought of opening his eyes to meet her gaze now for a quick death as opposed to waiting to be injected with caustic venom briefly crossed Harry’s hysterical mind, but he dismissed it almost immediately. He wasn’t suicidal (yet), just terrified beyond all reason.

He felt like he was going to vomit or cry. Or both.

“ _I ssssmell rot… I sssmell disease…_ ,” the infinitely more serpentine sounding hisses of the basilisk reached his ears, sounding distinctly suspicious. “ _Are you trying to poissson me?_ ”

“ _NO_ ,” Voldemort’s voice hissed out irritably. “ _Not THIS body. The boy is your gift…_ ,”

Voldemort must have gestured in Harry’s direction, because he could suddenly hear the slither of plate-sized scales sliding over the paving, coming right his way. There was a puff of sour breath on his face and he stiffened against the pillar, all of his fruitless struggles ceasing at the metal image of a gigantic snake’s nose INCHES away from his own.

“ _An enemy hatchling? It is tiny…_ ,” the basilisk hissed, so close to Harry’s ears that he could hear every tiny rise and fall of its syllables. “ _Hardly filling after yearssss of hunger…_ ,”

Later, Harry would admit he had no idea what came over him. Perhaps he’d subconsciously made the connection at last that Voldemort must not have factored Harry’s own parselmouth abilities into this plan to end him. Perhaps it was his own, newly discovered ‘aura of reason’ that had given him a crucial moment of clarity through the panic.

…but in the end, it was most likely the fact that for not the first time in his life, and far from the last, he was being confronted by a highly dangerous snake and his long honed instincts for dealing with such a situation finally kicked in.

“T-the _n- then what would you prefer to eat instead?!_ ” Harry abruptly blurted out, the familiar roll of parseltongue practically cascading off his lips in his fright.

…

There was a complete and utter silence in the Chamber of Secrets.

And then a rumbling, enraged hiss filled the air as Harry felt a rush of wind against his face, the basilisk’s bulk swinging away from him.

“ _YOU WOULD DARE TRY TO FEED ME ANOTHER SSSPEAKER?!_ ” the basilisk roared out, the shriek like tone of the hiss hurting Harry’s ears. “ _WHAT DECEPTION ISSS THISS?!_ ”

“M-my lord, what is going o-?!” the terrified, stammering voice of Quirrell started to shout in alarm.

“NO YOU FOOL, DON’T OPEN YOUR-!” Voldemort began to yell back in English, but he suddenly-

-cut off.

… _thwump_

There was a telling, soft thud of cloth and flesh against the stone floor in the wake of this new silence.

… _crrreeaak, snap, slither, crrreeaak, gulp, gulp_ …

And then a horrifying cracking sound as sinews and muscles stretched… then a rustle of cloth… a soft squish of flesh or two… followed at last by a contented, wordless hiss.

Harry was too frightened to move, let alone speak. All he could do was listen to the sickening noises as his far too active imagination filled in the gruesome details for him.

“ _…in anssswer to you quessstion, little ssspeaker_ ,” the basilisk’s voice spoke out quietly after a few more moments of awful sounds. “ _I alwaysss prefer sssomething… larger_ ,”

The soft slither of scales against the smooth floor echoed emptily in Harry’s ears, moving further and further out of his hearing range.

…

After a few moments, the tough ropes binding Harry to the column frayed and unwound, disappearing into nonexistence as the magic of the one whom had summoned them faded, perhaps this time for good.

Unable to hold his feet under him for a second longer, Harry slid to the ground, eyes still firmly shut.

He began to sob.

\-------

There was a single moment of horrified incredulity, followed directly by another full of virulent swear words directed at a certain useless minion who just COULDN’T KEEP THEIR EYES SHUT-

And then, once more Voldemort was floating, in terrible pain, unceremoniously ejected from his now thoroughly dead host body and being rapidly pulled away roughly in the direction of Albania.

He wanted to scream in frustration, but he no longer had the lungs nor lips to do so.

Everything had been going so well!

They’d had the philosopher’s stone, and a safe place in which to brew the elixir of life once they’d appeased the temperamental basilisk with their little ‘offering’.

They’d had Harry Potter entirely at their mercy, and Voldemort had honestly quite enjoyed being able to crow about the fascinating realisation that he’d had about the boy all while safe in the knowledge that he wouldn’t live long enough to employ such information against him.

They’d had a way to kill the boy (courtesy of the basilisk) without risking another rebounding spell like that of ten years before, and to dispose of his body in a way it would never be recovered.

They’d even had multiple well-hidden routes out of the Chamber available once Voldemort’s body was restored, from the old hunting tunnel to the forbidden forest to the myriad of magically widened pipes that the basilisk could use to patrol the school above.

Hell, Voldemort had even been hopeful that he might be able to… persuade the basilisk to create a distraction to cover their escape when the time came! He was still an Heir of Slytherin after all, it wouldn’t take many… selectively descriptive words about certain students above to convince the beast to ‘protect Hogwarts’ in the way it had been bred for.

(The beast had certainly been disoriented enough upon waking not to realise just whom had summoned it after all- repeating the same trick he used in 1943 would have likely worked. And if not… well, there were always certain spells he could have used once he was back at full strength to strip the basilisk of its free will)

…

…but as prepared as he’d been, as much as he’d planned and schemed and plotted, even with all of the information he’d uncovered… there’d still been one fatal secret left uncovered that had been his downfall.

For Lord Voldemort hadn’t been the only one in the Chamber capable of communicating with the basilisk.

And Harry Potter had revealed this newest ‘gift’-

(-and Merlin, just how many rare abilities did that infuriating boy even possess?! Budding occlumency shields, a powerful passive aura, and now freaking PARSELTONGUE-! This was getting ridiculous!-)

-at EXACTLY the wrong moment, enraging the basilisk at Voldemort’s (for once) unintentional deception, frightening Quirrell into opening his eyes and-

…well, here he was.

A creature of no more than shadowy vapour and malice once more, looking down upon the secret chamber of his noble ancestor as the basilisk devoured his old host (AND the philosopher’s stone damn it-!) whole. So much for smelling of rot and disease…

The pull calling him back to his (quite literal in a sense) old haunting grounds was strong, but Voldemort hung on out of sheer spite, battling his way towards the newly unbound, hysterical and hopefully vulnerable to possession Harry Potter while he still had a chance.

…

…

…but…

For a split second… he hesitated.

There was something… something about the boy when he looked at him in this spirit-state, something that murmured to him in this brief moment of reason that… that it might be unwise to harm him like he had Quirrell… like all the other unfortunate creatures he’d possessed before…

_There must be some other way…_

The almost foreign thought froze him in his tracks. Why would-?

And that moment of doubt was more than enough for the pull to go achingly taut, and he was dragged screaming all the way into the darkness of a half-life once more, all near-revelations forgotten as the madness closed back in.

\-------

Severus Snape, whom had been bullied into accepting a tankard-sized mug of strong coffee by worried house elves at approximately three am in lieu of being forced to go to bed (like several of his colleagues had been), watched the ongoing exchange between the headmaster and Sirius Black before him with a familiar feeling of contempt stirring in his gut.

He’d been mentally preparing for this moment from the very second he’d received news that Black was to receive a proper trial.

For this… first meeting between them after Black was inevitably freed.

Severus had imagined the encounter time and time again- Black swaggering up to him in his usual overconfident manner, an insult ready on his tongue and his wand raised tauntingly, the barbed words that would be exchanged and the fight that would inevitably ensue…

…and yet…

…yet now… Black hadn’t even appeared to have even NOTICED the scowling potion’s master brooding on the other side of the half-empty staff room, all of his frantic energy over the disappearance of his godson directed solely at Albus Dumbledore.

…

Even Severus had to admit the man made for a surprisingly intimidating sight, looking every inch a wizarding lord as he grilled Dumbledore for information that the aurors hadn’t had time to give him… an impressive feat considering Black was still dressed in paw-printed muggle pyjamas, fuzzy slippers and a flimsy hospital dressing gown.

(Apparently, Black had received a midnight owl from a ‘concerned ex-colleague’ on the team of aurors currently combing the school about the situation. Of course, he’d then insisted on coming with them under the pretence of being Potter’s legal guardian, and the ministry could hardly refuse such a request. The alternative, Severus mused humourlessly considering how agitated Black was, would have had to have been sedating him and tying him to his hospital bed)

“-the wards form a complete, unbroken sphere around Hogwarts and its grounds, including both the black lake and the forbidden forest,” Dumbledore wearily concluded his appeasing explanation to the irate Sirius Black. “I would have been alerted immediately if either Professor Quirrell or Harry crossed the ward line at any point, whether they walked, flew, swam or even tunnelled out. The floo network is on lockdown, apparition is forbidden as always and an exiting portkey would have triggered the wards as any other crossing would. Your godson IS still in the school somewhere, believe me. It’s just a matter of finding him,”

“And what of his safety, Dumbledore?” Black growled, grey eyes flashing menacingly. “Can your precious wards tell you if he’s unharmed? If he’s even still ALIVE?!”

As Black’s voice rose to a yell with these last words, making more than one of remaining staff jump in alarm, Severus finally had had enough. Slamming his tankard of coffee on the table hard enough to make his colleagues jump again, Severus stood menacingly and caught Black’s attention for the first time since he’d entered the room.

“Any death on the school grounds would also alert the wards, you imbecilic mutt!” Severus snapped harshly. “Yelling at the headmaster will make utterly no difference to your godson’s situation!”

Now, Severus thought with bitter satisfaction, Black would snap back at him. Perhaps even draw his wand in anger, or perhaps even forgo that and lunge at him with his bare fists-

But he did not.

Looking at Severus with an odd, almost constipated expression on his face, Black instead took in a deep breath through his nose, shut his eyes, and then breathed out through his mouth.

When his grey eyes opened and focused upon the potion’s master once again, Severus suddenly got the awful feeling that he was NOT prepared to deal with whatever was coming.

With this… strange, unpredictable new version of Sirius Black.

“In that case, Snape,” Black retorted with his teeth gritted, almost spitting out the name (and the use of his actual surname rather than some insulting nickname almost made Severus knock over his coffee). “What do you suggest I can do to HELP?”

“Sit DOWN, and WAIT,” Severus hissed out before his brain could catch up with his mouth, a distant logical part of his mind screaming at him to shut up. “You are NOT an auror, and you are NOT even meant to be out of hospital yet! Let those more qualified than YOU do their JOBS!”

The whole of the staffroom seemed to be holding their breaths as Black and Snape locked eyes, cutting grey to inky black. Irma Pince seemed closer to resisting the urge to shush them, but the rest of the room looked at them both like they were watching a keg of gunpowder being showered by sparks. Dumbledore, his usual twinkle long absent from his tired eyes, even had a cautious hand over his wand.

And then, sharply and suddenly-

-Black sat down in the nearest chair, still looking broody and worried but keeping his mouth firmly shut.

(Even Severus Snape couldn’t stop himself from gaping alongside the rest of his colleagues in the blessed silence that had followed.

Just what had HAPPENED to Black in Azkaban?!)

\-------

Harry awoke not having properly realised he’d even fallen unconscious.

The Chamber of Secrets was dark around him, the dim green glow emanating from the ceiling casting more shadows than it helped actually illuminate the area. He was exhausted and sore, and his face felt sticky with dried tears and blood. Quirrell’s body was gone. Whatever remained of Voldemort had gone with him. And the basilisk…

Harry shuddered, and wiped the crusty sleep from the corners of his eyes. He didn’t even want to THINK about that particular near-death experience.

Somehow, he was still alive- even after all of that. And now, he needed to get back to Hogwarts before that changed.

Somewhat disoriented, Harry leaned heavily on the vaguely warm, scaly surface that he’d fallen asleep against in his panicked exhaustion, pushing himself shakily to his feet-

-wait, warm SCALY surface?

“ _The little ssspeaker awakensss_ ,” an all too familiar rumbling hiss vibrated through the firm-soft surface his balancing hand was resting on, and Harry somehow managed not to shriek aloud.

Slamming his eyes shut reactively as the basilisk began to move-slither-coil around him, Harry stumbled back into yet another portion of the massive creature’s body, the lukewarm heat of its reptilian body soaking through the material of his robes.

(Had it been sunbathing recently? Or was there some kind of heated nest for it somewhere in the Chamber-? Wait, damn it brain, now is not the time for inconsequential questions-!)

“ _You ssstink of fear…_ ,” the basilisk hissed quietly. “ _Why are you afraid? The one who would have fed you to me isss gone_ ,”

Gulping audibly and painfully forcing up the broken shards of his occlumency shields before he wet himself from fright, Harry tried to blindly shuffle away from the snake behind him… only to practically walk into another coil of scales directly in front of him.

He was surrounded.

“ _I… I’ve never met a basilisk before_ ,” Harry chokingly managed to hiss out. “ _You’re quite intimidating in your own right_ ,”

Luckily, the massive serpent let out a breathy, hiss-like chuckle at this, taking the sort-of-compliment as Harry had hoped.

The massive coils around Harry gradually tightened, pressing against his rope-bruised arms and torso lightly and making him stand very, VERY still.

“ _There isss no need to keep your eyesss ssshut little ssspeaker_ ,” the basilisk crooned coaxingly at him, her acrid breath washing over his face and making him want to choke. “ _My gaze doesss not affect true ssspeakers… more proof that the one who would have fed you to me wasss an impossster_ ,”

The snake sounded truly agitated at this last admittance, and probably against his better judgement, Harry slid his eyes open a crack.

He couldn’t help but squeak in alarm as he was met by two great, luminous golden eyes barely a foot away from his nose, set into deep sockets lined with emerald green scales. The basilisk’s mouth was closed, concealing her fangs and making her appear deceptively docile… despite her current position ripe to constrict and crush Harry to a bloody paste if she so wished. The bald, raised ridge above her eyes (from which the red plume of a male basilisk would grow, if Harry remembered correctly) was lightly furrowed, giving the snake an almost human-looking expression of mixed curiosity and concern.

It was only after mentally cataloguing all of these things that Harry realised, one: he wasn’t dead or petrified and two: he should probably breathe before he passed out again.

As he let out a great, shaky exhale of relief, a filmy ‘lid’ of sorts briefly blinked across both of the basilisk’s eyes, briefly turning the luminous gold to a milder honey colour before receding.

“ _Sssee? You are truly one of Sssalazar’sss dessscendantsss_ ,” the basilisk hissed comfortingly… though Harry could also hear a similar undertone of relief permeating her voice at having not mistakenly killed him. “ _I am Guardian-of-Hogwartsss. Welcome to your ancessstor’sss sssecret Chamber_ ,”

…

What.

Wait, WHAT?!

With a final brief, daresay meant to be comforting, squeeze, _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ ’s massive coils unwound from around Harry, letting him stand shakily on his own two feet as he desperately tried to process that last sentence. Harry was-? Or the basilisk THOUGHT that Harry was-?!

As the basilisk ‘blinked’ again-

(-odd, surely Sophie’s books would have mentioned basilisks having eyelids of a sort, not to mention parselmouths being immune to their gaze- perhaps _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had been a special creation of sorts-? Wait, no! This was STILL not the time to be thinking about such things!-)

-Harry skilfully shoved all of his whirling thoughts to the back of his mind and took a much needed moment to take a mental inventory of himself.

He still felt tired and woozy, but the brief tremors in his fingers were the only remaining indication that he’d suffered under the Cruciatus curse (though he was sure to ache tomorrow with the aftereffects…) and the only physical damage he could find was the bruises left by the summoned ropes that had bound him.

His occlumency shields were in tatters, and it would take a great deal of careful meditation and restful sleep to rebuild them (likely even more so than he had needed after Halloween, Harry realised with a grimace) but otherwise it appeared he was thinking fairly clearly and no obvious mind-altering spells had been used on him.

(And if they had, then perhaps his aura had neutralised…? No, Harry quickly shoved that train of thought to the back of his mind alongside the ‘Heir of Slytherin’ dilemma. He could deal with all that LATER. AFTER he’d found his way back to Hogwarts)

Hesitantly Harry looked back at _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ , whom was watching him expectantly. Before he could open his mouth to ask if she knew a way back to the school however, the basilisk spoke.

“ _I took the liberty of ssscouting through my passssagesss while you ssslept, little ssspeaker_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ hissed dutifully as their eyes met. “ _There are red-robed ssstrangers amidssst the ssstaff of the ssschool, looking for sssomething. The hatchlingsss are all asssleep in their bedsss, sssafe… Do you know if the red-robesss are friendsss or foesss?_ ”

Harry blinked in surprise, and his mind quickly translated ‘red-robes’ to ‘aurors’. Merlin’s beard, they’d called in AURORS?! And-

-hang on a moment, if the basilisk had passages through the school from here, then-

“ _Hogwarts is nearby?!_ ” Harry exclaimed.

“ _Hogwartsss is above usss_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ confirmed, seemingly amused. “ _Where elssse would Ssssalazar build hisss Chamber?_ ”

They were below the school. There was a BASILISK below the SCHOOL. Stunned by the thought, Harry could only stand and gape for a minute. If nothing else, the location of the Chamber explained how Quirrell/Voldemort had gotten him out from under the noses of all the teachers so easily… But then, what about the Hogwarts wards?

Concentrating hard for a moment, Harry closed his eyes and reached out with his oddly numbed ‘magic-sense’… nothing. Undeterred this time, Harry reached further… and sure enough, on the very edge of the range of his magical senses, the familiar hum of matrix of wards that cloaked Hogwarts were still there!

They just somehow… skipped over his general location. It almost felt like there was some kind of bubble, a blind spot if you would, in the wards that shielded the Chamber of Secrets alone from their effects. Which probably explained why Voldemort repeatedly casting an unforgivable curse hadn’t triggered the wards and alerted half a dozen professors, all the house ghosts, Filch and his cat to boot.

“ _The red-robes are friends, I think_ ,” Harry said quickly as he realised the basilisk was still waiting for an answer to her previous question. “ _I think they might be looking for me in fact… I didn’t exactly come down here of my own free will_ ,”

“ _Clearly_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ agreed with a nod of her boulder-sized head. “ _But purpossssefully or not, the fact is that you are here in the Chamber… and the impossster is not. You are the only Heir of Ssslytherin in resssidence at Hogwwartsss now. There isss much we need to sssspeak about… but perhapsss it would be for the bessst if you returned to the cassstle above for a while firssst, before you are misssssed?_ ”

Harry managed to force a strained smile. Figuring things out with the suddenly friendly basilisk whom had eaten his DADA professor and seemed to think he was a descendant of her long dead creator-

(-and was he really? Or was the basilisk merely confused by his knowledge of parseltongue…? No, no more questions now, not the time or place! He could think/panic about this all when he was OUT of here!-)

-was a task he could handle LATER, once he’d called off the auror search, explained what happened to Quirrell (somehow), and had a good night’s sleep (or three or four) in his own bed.

“ _Show me the way out?_ ” Harry asked as politely as he could, and _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ nodded her head once again, before turning and slithering off between the columns.

Reluctantly, Harry followed her.

\-------

It took a long, LONG twenty minutes of picking their way through engraved columns, opening doors that only responded to a human parselmouth’s words (a few were notably already open, likely left that way by Voldemort for some unknown reason) and navigating through the slimy, mossy, pitch black catacombs that riddled the area around the primary chamber before they reached a viable exit to the school above.

Upon leaving the greenish dimness of the inner chamber Harry had realised that he was still missing his wand, for want of a simple _lumos_ charm. When he mentioned this to the curious basilisk, worried that maybe Quirrell/Voldemort had thrown it away somewhere in the halls they’d left behind… she’d instead promptly retched up a sickeningly familiar set of ripped and bile drenched robes, an unwound turban… and two wands.

(Harry had no way of knowing this, but a certain blood-red stone- which by design was meant to dissolve quickly in certain brews- had already been mostly digested in the equally unknowing basilisk’s stomach alongside its thief’s corpse)

Cringing, Harry picked up and wiped off his own sticky holly wand (it hummed happily in his hands as he picked it up as usual, amazingly no harm done) and gingerly thanked _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ for its return. The basilisk accepted the thanks happily, seemingly oblivious to Harry’s discomfort as he cast the wand-lighting charm to guide their way.

By the time they’d reached the slimy antechamber with the long, almost vertical pipe leading upwards and out, Harry had… well, mostly accustomed himself to the massive snake’s presence. It was fairly obvious that she had no wish to harm him-

(-indeed, she wanted him to return to the chamber later on to ‘speak about’ his new status as the in-residence ‘Heir of Slytherin’, and dear Merlin the place in the back of his mind where he was storing all of these unwanted questions and mysteries was starting to get crowded-)

-but it was hard for him to simply forget that she had killed and eaten one of his teachers right in front of him. Even if said teacher had been plotting to kill Harry at the time.

“ _There is an exit on the sssecond floor of the casssstle at the top of thissss pipe_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ explained, gesturing towards the yawning tunnel before them with her head. “ _If you ssstand on my head, I can lift you up to reach it, little ssspeaker_ ,”

“ _What if there’s someone outside_?” Harry asked worriedly, immediately thinking of what would happen if the basilisk poked her head out in front of the searching aurors. It would be a massacre- potentially on both sides, if any of them had the presence of mind to summon or transfigure a rooster.

(Although considering some of the other non-standard basilisk traits _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ possessed, Harry wouldn’t be surprised to learn if she’d been made immune to the sound of rooster crowing too)

In answer to Harry’s question, the basilisk blinked her transparent, milky eyelids, turning radiant gold to honey… but unlike before, they stayed closed.

“ _Like thisss, my eyesss are sssafe for anyone to gaze upon_ ,” the basilisk hissed proudly. “ _Now come- no time to wassste_ ,”

Clambering onto _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ ’s head was fairly easy, as was steadying himself by clutching at the ridge on her brow as she reared upwards through the long, twisting pipe, pausing just before another solid barrier that only answered to Harry’s hissed ‘ _open_ ’. They emerged into an empty (thankfully), dilapidated girl’s bathroom from an opening where a sink would have once been. It was dark outside through the windows, with the faintest light of dawn just appearing over the horizon.

“ _Thank you so much for helping me_ ,” Harry thanked the basilisk sincerely as he slid off her scaly head.

“ _I was born to protect Sssalazar’s heirsss… and the hatchlingsss of Hogwartsss. It wasss only right_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ replied. “ _Return to visssit me when you feel ready. We have much to dissscusss. With your permissssion, I will fill my belly in the foressst and familiarisssse myssself with the cassstle again while I wait, little ssspeaker_ ,”

“ _You have my permission. Just don’t let yourself be seen, I doubt the staff know you still exist_ ,” Harry cautioned the clearly hungry snake worriedly. “ _And don’t attack anyone in the castle- or anything just living peacefully in the forest for that matter, just… stick to eating things that are hostile to the school if you can? And er… call me Harry?_ ”

“ _Of courssse. Until you return… farewell little Harry_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ hissed formally, bobbing her head in a nod one last time before her bulk retreated back down the pipe. Once the honey-gold of her eyes was well out of sight, Harry hissed a quick ‘ _close’_ and the sink that disguised the tunnel reappeared.

Letting out a deep breath he didn’t know he’d been holding, Harry straightened his dusty and slimed robes as best he could, sheathed his slightly bile-sticky wand back in his cloth arm-holster, and unsteadily walked out of the bathroom to try and find a teacher or auror as soon as he could.

(He didn’t notice the jaw-dropped expression of utter disbelief from the silvery, pig-tailed ghost that had been watching him from the bathroom stalls)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all your wonderful comments and kudos!
> 
> So Harry has made it through his second ever encounter with Voldemort (mostly) unscathed! Poor Voldy, everything was going SO well for him and then Quirrell's jumpiness ruined it all... although, even if his host had managed to keep his eyes shut, Voldy would have probably been in quite hot water with the basilisk anyway for trying to deceive it (again). Goes to show that no matter how much you plan or how many contingencies you put in place, things can STILL go horribly wrong.  
> At least he has more information on Harry now for whenever they meet again... Maybe with a slightly different plan in mind...
> 
> What will Dumbledore do once informed of this encounter I wonder? :)
> 
> Next time: The Aftermath... or, Sirius ALSO thought the kidnappings and murder attempts were over, damn it!


	18. The Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day following the 'Quirrell Incident'

When Professor Quirinus Quirrell disappeared abruptly from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry on an evening in the late February of 1992, it was quickly and unanimously decided that the famed DADA curse had struck once again and there was nothing to be done.

After all, the Hogwarts wards had not registered a death upon the grounds, so the DMLE had no REAL reason to force an investigation upon the school.

The student that had gone missing around the same time as the ex-defence professor (one Harry Potter) had reappeared in the castle before the next dawn, so there had been no REAL reason for the aurors to stay once detentions had been assigned for ‘breaking curfew’ and ‘causing an undue scare’.

And of course, there was no official record of the ‘philosopher’s stone’, of all items, having ever been in Hogwarts at all, let alone stolen for some nefarious purpose, so there was no REAL reason for Quirinus to be pursued any further!

By the time morning had come the next day, an official story had already been hashed out, substitute lessons for DADA had been arranged, and the aurors were well on their way back to the ministry. All was well.

…

But Harry had been devastated by the news of the blatant cover-up.

\--------

The debrief of the TRUE events that had occurred that night had been long, difficult and mildly traumatising for everyone involved.

The four Hogwarts heads of house had been outright horrified, a number of concerned aurors had been queasily taking down notes, the headmaster himself had looked less twinkly eyed than ever and Sirius Black (whom by this stage was also running on copious amounts of caffeine, just like the rest of the staff) had been practically besides himself with worry over his pale, filthy and bleeding godson.

(Not to mention the sheer outrage of one frantic Madam Poppy ‘what do you mean Cruciatus exposure?!’ Pomfrey)

Somehow the most composed out of all present at that moment, poor little Harry had painstakingly recounted all of the of the unbelievable events of the past twelve hours from his hospital wing bed… only for Dumbledore to up and start planning out an ‘alternative’ story for the aurors to take back to Madam Bones almost immediately afterwards.

(Unusual for the normally emotionally-sensitive headmaster, but it wasn’t unthinkable that Dumbledore might have already used up his daily reserves of tact dealing with the panicking staff, the aurors and, well, Sirius Black himself)

That, unsurprisingly, had been the last straw, and Harry’s unnaturally calm composure had finally broke.

Thankfully most of the interrogating group had been summarily chased out of the hospital wing by Pomfrey as soon as his godson had started to stammer and argue in distressed disbelief about ‘truth’ and ‘justice’.

As for Sirius himself… well, he understood why Harry’s fantastic story couldn’t exactly be told to the wider public. Didn’t stop him from being extremely irritated about the situation on Harry’s behalf, but at least he understood.

“It’s better this way pup,” Sirius Black sighed quietly to himself, sitting in a chair by Harry’s bed in the hospital wing. “The Chamber of Secrets… the bloody Dark Lord…! You’d just be brushed off as a hysterical kid… if it weren’t for Dumbledore and Snape’s abilities, you might have been already,”

The exhausted boy had sequestered himself underneath his blankets, curled up into a tight little ball and facing away from his well-meaning godfather.

It was inconclusive whether or not Harry was actually asleep, but he had been given a dose of dreamless sleep by Madam Pomfrey at the same time as his first dose of nerve relaxant an hour before, so odds were high he was. On the other side of the room, where he was preparing the next dose of nerve-relaxant, Severus Snape rolled his eyes.

“Better way or not,” Snape said in a dry, sarcastic tone, measuring out a portion from a larger distilling flask into a single use vial. “It remains that the entire staff of a learning institution- with the complicity of an entire squad of supposedly ‘law-abiding’ aurors, I might add- are covering up the theft of an objectively priceless item, the kidnapping of an underage boy, the repeated use of an unforgivable curse, the possession of a teacher by the disembodied spirit of the ‘supposedly’ long-dead Dark Lord, the death of said teacher and- oh, I almost forgot- the existence of a BASILISK on the school grounds,”

Sirius Black couldn’t quite supress a wince at the bluntness of the potion master’s words.

“Well, when you put it that way, it does sound pretty bad,” Sirius reluctantly admitted.

“Don’t sound so surprised. Cover ups and obscuration of the truth are long-practiced traditions of Dumbledore’s tenure as Headmaster, as you well know,” Snape snapped bitingly, corking the vial with a practiced flourish of his hand.

Sirius winced again. Whose idea had it been to leave him and Snape alone in the hospital wing with Harry again? It had been a rather suspicious coincidence that they’d been the only two whom had ended up staying rather than joining the cover-up pow-wow in Dumbledore’s office.

“For what it’s worth, I am sorry about that whole… incident with the shrieking shack,” the dressing-gown clad man mumbled awkwardly. “I was young, and an idiot, but that doesn’t change the fact that I almost killed you that night. I probably should have been expelled then and there,”

Snape paused for a moment where he was packing away his potion decanting kit, before seemingly deciding to ignore Sirius’s awkward apology and continuing. The sun was rising slowly outside the great arched windows of the hospital wing; the dawn of a brilliant new day upon which soon hundreds of oblivious children would be waking all over the castle, ready to embrace the weekend.

Most of them probably wouldn’t even notice their errant DADA professor was missing until Monday morning.

“Make sure Mr Potter takes this upon waking,” Snape curtly instructed, sweeping over to the bedside table and placing the newly decanted vial neatly in the centre, where it couldn’t easily roll away. “It should ease the worst of the aftereffects of the torture curse,”

“Thank you Snape,” Sirius murmured tiredly, but no less sincerely for his exhaustion.

He expected the dour potions professor to sweep out of the room then, robes billowing and phantom dramatic string music playing in the background… but Snape didn’t move. Sirius could practically feel dark eyes boring into his skull from over on the other side of Harry’s bed, but he kept his gaze carefully fixed upon the lump his godson made under the sheets.

(Sirius was not a dedicated practitioner of occlumency by any means, but he’d heard enough lectures from Florian to know to avoid direct eye contact if he didn’t want his brain being put through a fine sieve by a careless- or simply vindictive- legilimens)

“…you’ve changed, Black,” Snape eventually said, finally causing Sirius to raise his eyes to him. The ex-Death Eater looked practically in pain admitting as such, and Sirius couldn’t quite help the weary, cocky smile that graced his lips.

“Yes, I have,” Sirius admitted, taking Snape’s words for the backhanded compliment they were. “Thankfully,”

\-------

It had been months since Sirius had seen Harry in person, and if he’d had his way their eventual reunion wouldn’t have been while he was half-asleep and running on fumes, and while Harry was fresh from yet another kidnapping.

(And Sirius had foolishly thought that the kidnappings and attempted murders had ended for good… Oh well, there went their five year streak of peace. Come to think of it, he owed Antonin a blanket now)

They hadn’t exactly talked much yet, one on one. Harry had fallen asleep-

(-or at least, had retreated into his blankets and ignored everyone until he had fallen asleep-)

-almost immediately after the interrogation-

(-and no matter what other names Dumbledore might have called it, that’s unquestionably what it had been-)

-had finished, and Sirius hadn’t really been in a state to be casually chatting at that moment anyway.

Sirius had eventually managed to fall asleep himself at some point shortly after dawn (once the caffeine had worn off of course), getting an awful crick in his back from the hard hospital wing chair in the process, and awoke at some point just past eleven to the sound of Harry’s confused chattering with an exasperated Pomfrey.

Apparently, despite the relative secrecy of the events of the previous night and Harry’s stay in the hospital wing, his godson already had visitors.

Three of them in fact, all of whom Sirius instantly recognised from the myriad of descriptions he’d received in Harry’s letters as they tumbled through the doors.

It really should have come as no surprise that no sooner had the two boys and a girl had clustered around Harry’s bedside, his godson had immediately begun recounting everything that had happened to him. And this time, to much more receptive ears… if no less horrified by the more grisly details.

“The Chamber of Secrets,” the Slytherin boy, ‘Theo’, said flatly at the conclusion of Harry’s explanation.

“Yes,” Harry confirmed.

“Underneath the school,” Theo continued. “Home to a thousand year old basilisk,”

“Yes,” Harry repeated.

“Can we… visit?” the Hufflepuff girl, Sophie, asked hesitantly, seemingly torn between bouncing in her seat in excitement and biting her nails in worry.

“Ye- wait, NO!” Harry exclaimed with a groan. “I don’t even know if _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ will let non-parselmouths down there! Besides, it’s filthy and dangerous!”

“Harry, we are NOT letting you go back down there alone,” Frank and Alice’s son, Neville, spoke up softly, the slight trembling of his balled hands in his lap the only tell of his true apprehension of such an excursion. “You nearly DIED. If you’re going, we’re going,”

“Absolutely,” Sophie agreed, trying her best not to look too excited by the prospect for the benefit of her less reptile-inclined friends. “If Sasha-,”

“ _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ ,” Harry absently corrected Sophie’s butchering of the parseltongue name with a complex hiss that was as incomprehensible to Sirius’s ears as always.

“-wants you to act as Slytherin’s Heir, then you’d be entitled to a couple of formal bodyguards, right Theo?” Sophie continued without missing a beat.

Theo sighed heavily, mouthing something to himself that looked suspiciously like ‘why me?’ before eventually saying:

“Technically, yes,” Theo said long-sufferingly. “In truth though? These two would probably follow you down there anyway and drag me along for the ride no matter what. Please ask the giant snake politely not to eat us?”

“Oh not you too! I thought you were the sensible one Theo!” Harry moaned despairingly, garnering some chuckles from his little circle of friends. Neville gave him a few solemn, condescending pats on the head, trying and failing to supress his own nervous grin.

Sirius smiled discretely from his chair in the corner, watching Harry and his companions banter back and forth about a potential expedition to the ‘Chamber of Secrets’. In all honesty, Sirius found he wasn’t too worried about his godson returning to such a place, friends alongside him or not.

From what Harry had recounted-

(-twice over in Sirius’s presence now, in fact… although he had a suspicion his godson had left out some pertinent details of the Dark Lord’s monologue both times. Harry still seemed highly unnerved about whatever it was the evil bastard had said to him before trying to feed him to a gigantic snake, and Sirius certainly wasn’t going to force the poor boy to share-)

-the basilisk that had saved him from Quirrell/the Dark Lord seemed much more intelligent than the usual snakes that his godson was known for bartering with, and had a vested interest in him to boot. If anything, Sirius thought, Harry would likely be safer down in the Chamber of Secrets than he was up here in the wider castle… especially if the basilisk’s belief that Harry was an Heir of Slytherin was true. (And wasn't THAT a thought...)

Even if the creature was mistaken and Harry was a parselmouth by other means, it didn’t change the fact that his godson remained immune to its gaze and held a higher status in its deadly eyes than the so-called ‘imposter’ that had been Lord-professor-quirrell-mort.

(Sirius really needed to get a copy of the Potter family tree at some point and start tracing bloodlines- clearly James hadn’t told him everything about his family genealogy, if he’d even known… Merlin, half of his ex-cell mates back in the northern tower would have an aneurism if it turned out the Potters of all families were of Slytherin blood)

“Uncle Padfoot, please tell them they can’t go to the Chamber with me!” Harry’s desperate whine broke through Sirius’s thoughts.

He looked up to find four sets of eyes, three extremely determined and unlikely to be undeterred and one pleading hopelessly, fixed upon him.

(Young Neville’s expression in particular reminded Sirius of the one Alice had once worn when he’d (foolishly) tried to ask the much older girl out to Hogsmeade. The ‘you’re not going to convince me of anything Black, try again later’ look, as Remus had once called it)

Sirius could only laugh, warm relief spreading through him at the lightness that had finally returned to Harry’s eyes.

“Sorry pup, you’re on your own there!” he chuckled, and Harry groaned again.

\-------

“I don’t think He died with Quirrell,” Harry softly admitted to Sirius.

Saturday had passed by in in blur of check-ins from Madam Pomphrey, more potions to stave off the worst of the post-Cruciatus exposure ache, the lengthy visit from Harry’s friends and a lip-service ‘detention’ from Professor Flitwick, whom had merely sat down them for an hour and aggressively lectured Harry that his kidnapping and Quirrell’s subsequent death was not in any way his fault and ‘don’t you dare feel guilty for any of it!’.

(Merlin, Sirius was growing to love that tiny professor in a way he never had when at school himself. If he’d known of Flitwick’s protective reputation back then, maybe he’d have argued more for Ravenclaw over Gryffindor with the hat)

It was now evening, and Harry and Sirius were eating a creamy pea soup with hot bread that the house elves had sent up for their dinner, alone in the hospital wing while everyone else was down in the great hall.

“What do you mean pup?” Sirius asked leadingly, already knowing- and admittedly, dreading- the answer he knew he would get.

“The Dark Lord,” Harry said with a heavy sigh, confirming Sirius’s fears. “I think He left Quirrell’s body behind once he died, and went back to… wherever He came from. But He’s not dead. Not by a long shot,”

“Do you want me to tell Dumbledore?” Sirius asked gently.

Harry had already suffered through one long interrogation in Dumbledore’s presence and Sirius would spare his godson a repeat of the experience if he could help it. The first time had not been made any easier by the fact that the Headmaster had insisted on calling Him ‘Voldemort’, something Sirius (and by extension, Harry) had trained themselves out of doing very quickly in Azkaban if they didn’t want to get themselves lynched.

(Getting their cellmates to gradually stop using the word ‘mudblood’ in the years that had followed had been a more than fair exchange in Sirius’s eyes)

“I think Professor Dumbledore already knows,” Harry sighed again, setting his half-full bowl aside and rubbing his eyes under his glasses. “He wasn’t surprised when I said I saw Him down in the Chamber… only when I said that He’d been using Quirrell as a vessel,”

“Yeah, that’s not suspicious at all,” Sirius said overly sarcastically, drawing a reluctant giggle out of his godson.

“I just…,” Harry said quietly, his brief smile fading. “I just wish we could all get along, you know? That there didn’t have to be fighting, or a war… or even two different sides that hated each other so much,”

“That’s just wizards for you pup,” Sirius said with a sad smile. “Sometimes I think we’re just all incapable of really seeing reason,”

Sirius didn’t know why Harry seemed to stiffen slightly at these words, but the inquiry on his lips was abruptly shelved as- speak of the devil- Professor Dumbledore came sweeping in through the hospital wing doors with his usual (if slightly more worn and tired) twinkly expression of warm regard back on his face.

“Ah, Sirius, Harry, I trust you both had a good day together?” the headmaster asked as he slid into an open seat on the opposite side of Harry’s bed.

Harry shrugged non-committedly as Sirius put his own bowl of mostly eaten soup aside.

“For being stuck in the hospital wing, it was okay I guess,” Harry mumbled, not looking up to meet Dumbledore’s eyes. Sirius could practically feel the resentment towards the headmaster coming off his godson in waves. Looks like the old wizard wasn’t quite forgiven for the cover-up yet then…

“Madam Pomfrey tells me you should be able to re-join the wider school population by tomorrow morning,” Dumbledore said encouragingly, his gaze flicking over to Sirius as Harry continued to refuse raise his head. “But alas, speaking of the opinions of medical professionals…,”

Dumbledore’s smile turned apologetic as Sirius made the connection in his head, groaning in exasperation.

“Bloody hell, St Mungo’s called you?” Sirius whined, admittedly somewhat childishly. “I’m FINE out here on my own,”

“And yet you haven’t slept in a proper bed for near twenty-four hours… and you are still dressed in your pyjamas,” Dumbledore pointed out, a twinkle of amusement shining in his eyes at Sirius’s glare. “I’d be happy to escort you to my personal floo; lest your healers start apparating to the school gates and lay a passive aggressive siege upon us,”

Sirius groaned theatrically again, finally garnering an amused, exasperated huff from Harry.

“Go on Uncle Padfoot,” Harry said with a small smile in his direction, still resolutely ignoring Dumbledore. “They might not clear you in time for summer if you keep arguing with them. Trust me, I know some of those healers,”

“Oh, FINE,” Sirius puffed melodramatically, standing with an audible creak from the hard chair he’d been occupying for the bulk of the day and doing his best to ignore how his knees protested the movement. “If my own godson says so…,”

He leaned down and embraced Harry in an enthusiastically returned hug.

“Keep writing to me, okay pup?” Sirius murmured in his ear as he pulled back.

“Of course,” Harry replied seriously, nodding his head. “I’ll see you when the summer holidays come, barring any more emergencies?”

Sirius raised a slow, sceptical eyebrow.

“Harry, my dear, sweet, innocent godson, are you suggesting that if I’m not cleared by summer then you’ll start fabricating emergencies I’ll have to come to the school for?” Sirius, equally seriously, asked with a completely straight face, managing to draw an actual snort from his godson.

“Well I wasn’t until you said that…,” Harry replied mischievously.

They bantered back and forth for a bit along these lines-

(-oh, Sirius had missed this so. Even if the regular pauses where they both once expected certain other voices to join in remained conspicuously silent-)

-getting sillier and sillier until Dumbledore, eyes still shining with amusement, pointedly cleared his throat and subtly produced his pocket-watch with a glance in Sirius’s direction.

Harry immediately sobered again as he remembered the headmaster’s presence in the room (Sirius had a feeling that grudge was going to last for a while; Harry could be remarkably slow to forgive certain offences), and finally bid Sirius farewell with one last wave from his bed as they exited the hospital wing.

It was quiet in the hallways, the evening meal in the great hall below still in full swing and any absent students more likely to be in their house commons than not with the setting of the sun. Dumbledore guided them both along the all too familiar path from the hospital wing to the headmaster’s office-

(-Merlin knew how many times the Marauders in their youth had been herded down said path-)

-his silence feeling vaguely foreboding in a way.

Sirius let out a deep sigh as the gargoyle that guarded the staircase to the headmaster’s tower came into sight (yep, it was just as ugly as he remembered it being) making Dumbledore pause for a moment.

“Okay, you obviously want to say something to me,” Sirius said bluntly, turning to face the headmaster as they slowed to a halt in the hallway. “Kindly spit it out before we’re both on opposite ends of the country again,”

“…I noticed that Harry seems a little upset we are keeping the truth of this matter hidden,” Dumbledore said carefully, after a moment of thought.

Sirius snorted humourlessly.

“That’s a bit of an understatement,” he said dryly, rolling his eyes. “Think of it from his point of view, Dumbledore. He’s just gone through a kidnapping by arguably one of the most dangerous wizards (questionably) alive, was tortured by said wizard, discovered the existence a long thought legendary Chamber hidden beneath the school containing a creature that could be unimaginably dangerous to the students if it wasn’t under his control-,”

(-thankfully, Sirius missed Dumbledore’s minute flinch at these words or else his rant might have devolved even further-)

“-and above all that, witnessed the DEATH of one of his TEACHERS,” Sirius finished heatedly, somehow keeping his urge to yell under control. “And then, THEN, after telling this all to a group of trusted adults, he hears they’re going to SWEEP IT ALL UNDER THE RUG. Now, I understand this is arguably for Harry’s own protection and I’m sure deep down Harry does too, but can you imagine opening up with an experience like that… and then having it, for all intents and purposes, ignored?”

This time, Sirius didn’t miss the way that Dumbledore seemed to deflate at his words, his usual twinkle dying in his eyes and his expression becoming grave. The headmaster gave a low sigh of his own, and beckoned Sirius over to the gargoyle guarding the staircase.

“Jelly snakes,” Dumbledore intoned tiredly, and the gargoyle leapt aside to make way for them to pass. As they both climbed onto the moving staircase, the headmaster spoke again.

“I can sympathise with Harry, but there is a lot more at stake than simply his reputation if news about the Chamber of Secrets becomes public,” Dumbledore gravely began to explain. “In fact, we were all very lucky that Harry was able to make his way out of the Chamber on his own- otherwise I am not sure there was anything we could have done to help him,”

Sirius belatedly noted that Dumbledore hadn’t said anything about the arguably more serious news that the DARK LORD was still at large, but he remained silent and waited for the older man to continue as he opened the door to his office. One explanation at a time was likely all he was going to get from the cryptic headmaster.

The many portraits on the walls of the office, alongside old sorting hat sitting on the shelf behind the headmaster’s desk, all turned to face them as they entered the room; watching, but saying nothing. Dumbledore’s phoenix, Fawkes if Sirius remembered rightly, chirped at them curiously from his perch as they crossed over to the empty fireplace.

“For you see, when the four founders of Hogwarts School grew old and first handed over the running of the school to a headmaster, there was an accord that was signed,” Dumbledore continued, lighting the fireplace with a flick of his wand and rummaging around on the mantelpiece for whatever he kept his floo powder in. “One that every new headmaster or mistress must also sign in order to formally take up the mantle. It was a decree of non-interference with certain parts of the castle that remained the private property of the founders and their families, rather than the property of the institution of Hogwarts School,”

Dumbledore turned back to Sirius with an ornate sugar bowl in hand, filled with familiar green powder.

“Namely the Scrying Tower of the Ravenclaw family, the Golden Forge of the Gryffindor family, the Siegeworks of the Hufflepuff family…,” Dumbledore trailed off knowingly, letting Sirius finish with:

“And the Chamber of Secrets of the Slytherin family, am I right?” Sirius concluded, getting a nod from Dumbledore in response. “And what, this decree of non-interference prevents you from doing anything to these ‘family spaces’?”

“Yes, and more than that,” Dumbledore sighed, giving a wan smile. “A formally sworn-in headmaster cannot so much as enter them without the permission of a present heir, unless they are of the requisite bloodline themselves. They cannot remove, modify or add anything to these spaces, including any wards that would otherwise affect Hogwarts as a whole-,”

Dumbledore nodded to a few of the puffing, spinning trinkets sitting around the room as he said this, all ward-monitors if Sirius had to guess by the Headmaster’s implication.

“-and they cannot block the entrances or exits to any of them, even unknowingly,” Dumbledore finished with a shrug. “Which, considering the exact locations of all of these places has been lost to time over the centuries, is probably fortunate. And also likely why Harry says that the exit he came through was in an out-of-order girl’s bathroom of all places; some other headmaster probably tried and failed to block off the original entrance centuries ago,”

Sirius sighed again (he’d been doing that A LOT today) and rubbed his face, attempting to think about this new information in an unbiased fashion.

“So,” Sirius summarised shortly. “This accord would have prevented you from going after Harry, even if you had known where the entrance to the Chamber was at the time… and would I be right in guessing that the massive basilisk inside falls under the category of ‘something you cannot remove’ from a founder’s family space?”

Dumbledore’s face brightened marginally at this understanding, and he gave a weary chuckle.

“Exactly,” he said, the cheeriness of his tone laced with subtle despair. “Now imagine the public finding out that there is a fully grown basilisk under Hogwarts, one that will only answer to one of Slytherin’s elusive heirs… and that neither the headmaster, nor any of his professors, can legally or magically do anything to hinder it? And that if agents of the ministry attempted to breach the Chamber themselves, I would be forced by contract to consider it an act of war?”

“Hence the cover-up, to avoid mass panic… at the relatively smaller expense of my godson’s goodwill. I see your dilemma,” Sirius muttered to himself, turning over this new information in his head as he finally took a handful of floo powder from the sugar bowl.

“I’m glad you do Sirius,” Dumbledore murmured back, placing the bowl back on the mantelpiece. “I only hope that Harry will also come to in time,”

“It might help if you actually told him all of this yourself,” Sirius said wryly as he tossed the powder into the flames, turning them an electric green. “Harry would never say no to a good explanation, even from yo- someone he’s upset with,”

“Ah, but that information is not entirely for me to give. Not to him,” Dumbledore answered him with a slightly more genuine smile and a helpless shrug. “Sasha will probably be quite upset with me if I explain everything to her newest charge before she gets the chance. Goodbye Sirius,”

“St Mungo’s Hospital!” Sirius called out as he stepped into the flames, barely managing a following- “Wait, what-?” before the floo network carried him away.

\-------

As the dressing gown clad figure of Sirius Black vanished into the flames, Fawkes trilled disapprovingly from his perch on the other side of the room, making Albus chuckle.

“Well, you must admit I have no chance of ever pronouncing her full name correctly,” Albus shrugged, his twinkle returning to his eyes. “I find Miss Roper’s nickname for her a much easier substitute,”

The phoenix ruffled his wings and ducked his head down, pretending to go to sleep. Albus felt his smile grow warm and fond. Fawkes wasn’t truly angry at him, or else the temperamental phoenix would have retreated to the Siegeworks like he had so many times before when he grew weary with his wizard’s strange behaviour. (And his admittedly poor habit of eavesdropping on his students)

Hufflepuff’s creatures were loyal to a fault; Fawkes was technically meant to be living in the Siegeworks full time now that Albus had taken up the headmaster’s position and thus rarely visited his distant ancestor’s quarters, but the phoenix had stubbornly stayed put at his side instead. There were probably several, if not dozens, of Hufflepuff’s descendants currently at the school that could easily find her chambers and take up a claim-

(-the woman had had eleven children. ELEVEN. And who knew how many grandchildren, legitimate and not. Compared to the relatively murky bloodlines of the other three founders, you could barely turn a corner in Wizarding Britain without tripping over some multiple-great grandchild of Helga’s-)

-and Fawkes would go to them if one ever actually entered her rooms, but he seemed content to remain bound to Albus in the meantime. If nothing else, the headmaster was grateful for the company.

He wondered if ‘Sasha’ might grow to be the same way with Harry… Tom Riddle certainly hadn’t managed to inspire such devotion from the basilisk during his time at school- most likely because of his deception of the creature in order to use her against innocent students.  Fawkes had delightfully recounted to Albus that after the 1943 attacks, the enraged snake had cursed Tom from entering the Chamber for twenty long years after poor Myrtle’s death, returning to her hibernation after relaying as such to the phoenix.

(Unfortunately, the questionable testimony of a transfiguration professor’s pet phoenix 'speaking' on the behalf of an unseen basilisk wasn’t exactly able to keep poor Rubeus Hagrid from being expelled- Headmaster Dippet had just stared blankly at his frankly desperate at the time Gryffindor head of house and then dryly congratulated him on the most complicated joke he’d heard all year)

Harry, Albus was certain, would make a much better ‘Heir of Slytherin’ than the young Voldemort ever had been.

Although… Albus frowned, returning to his desk and his neglected paperwork. There was still the lingering mystery of just where Harry’s claim to the Slytherin line had come from. The so-called ‘immortal beasts’ of the founders did not lie-

(-admittedly Albus had no reference for the mystery creatures of Ravenclaw or Gryffindor as his/Hufflepuff’s phoenix had not made contact with either of them during his short lifetime-)

-but they had their own methods of divining a blood connection from founder to heir, methods that wizards and witches could not easily replicate. Had the basilisk merely made a fortunate assumption based on Harry’s ability as a parselmouth? Or was there something even Albus had missed in the boy’s (admittedly, extensive) family tree?

After all, James Potter had been quite proudly as ‘not-Slytherin’ as you could get, and Lily Potter nee Evans had been muggleborn… or so he had thought.

It was a mystery, and one that Albus wasn’t quite content to let lie.

“Fawkes… may I ask you a favour?” the headmaster thoughtfully asked, and the phoenix cooed in response. “If something does happen…,”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all again for your comments and kudos! (And before I forget, yes InformalFallacy, you may make a TV tropes page for this fic if you'd like :))
> 
> I always thought it was a bit odd that Dumbledore/the ministry never made a more formal investigation into the Chamber of Secrets in cannon; so here I've put my own little headcannon of the headmaster's accord on the 'founder's spaces'. And yes, I've made the Dumbledore family descendants of Helga Hufflepuff in this fic (I haven't really seen the FBAWTFT movies, so apologies if my ideas are outside their cannon). I've always imagined that woman had a large family, or at least when compared to the other founders.  
> But that doesn't mean distant descendants of said others won't show up in the future... who knows? :)
> 
> Next time: Back into the Chamber of Secrets... or, genealogy is complicated


	19. Bloodlines and Answers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Quiet Ones properly explore the Chamber of Secrets, enthusiastically aided by its large reptilian inhabitant.

The remainder of the school term passed by incredibly quickly after Professor Quirrell’s largely unremarked-upon disappearance from Hogwarts.

All of the other professors (minus dearly departed Binns, of course) immediately came together in a long suffering (and clearly long practiced) fashion to take over the Defence Against the Dark Arts classes on a rotating basis for the rest of the year. Some, obviously, were better at it than others, with Professor Snape (strangely enough) coming out as possibly the best teacher of the extra subject… and with Professor Vector being incontestably the worst.

(Though the first and second years did get some excellent early exposure to the subject of Arithmancy, which was what Professor Vector openly taught instead of the accepted DADA curriculum- much to the rest of the staff’s frustration. Even the absent-minded Professor Trelawney still followed the correct syllabus, overuse of the words ‘inner eye’ notwithstanding!)

Aside from this slight change to Defence, routine continued as usual all around the castle. Lessons were learnt, quidditch was played, detentions were served and exams were prepared for. The vast majority of the student body remained entirely unaware of the events of that late February night… and thankfully, all of the inevitable rumours about Quirrell’s disappearance remained both fairly benign and nowhere even close to the truth.

As for Harry, besides his more regular exercises to carefully rebuild and reinforce his tattered occlumency shields, his life seemed to return to entirely normal, just like that.

There were no more pains in his forehead scar. No need to continue investigating the massive red herring the DADA curse had been. Even his nightmares (after an understandable initial spike) were starting to recede now that Quirrell and his… passenger were gone from the school. He was slowly coming to terms with the events of his most recent kidnapping, and while he still didn’t think he could forgive Dumbledore for the blatant cover-up anytime soon, well…

…life, regardless, was moving on. As if nothing had ever happened underneath the school on that February night.

The Daily Prophet hadn’t even given the disappearance of yet another Hogwarts defence teacher more than a half-page article when the news went public, instead occupied with the results of the internal ministry inquiry into Bartemius Crouch’s behaviour at the trial of Sirius Black… the supposedly sealed results, which had regardless somehow been acquired and published by one Rita Skeeter.

Put simply, the outcome of the inquiry (that the ministry had been trying to cover up, and for good reason) had been a far juicer scandal than the old news of ‘Hogwarts Defence Teacher Vanishes- Again’… not to mention the way Crouch had conveniently disappeared on ‘extended sick leave’ barely a week after the shocking results had been released to the public.

(It turned out that Sirius wasn’t the only innocent that had been railroaded by Crouch’s administration of the DMLE during the war… the length of the list of accused Death Eaters that had ‘mysteriously vanished’ while in the custody of Crouch’s aurors was frankly terrifying on its own, not to mention the new documentation of his own appalling behaviour towards anyone he suspected wasn’t firmly on the side of the ministry.

No matter what horrors Crouch might have been subjected to by the angry public that had forced him to go on extended leave, Harry still couldn’t bring himself to feel sorry for the man)

\-------

Once the Easter holidays came about, Harry finally steeled himself and decided it was time he went back into the Chamber of Secrets. And, as they’d all promised/threatened, Neville, Sophie and Theo hadn’t let him go back alone.

“You were right Harry,” Theo said with a wrinkle of his nose as the bathroom sink slid away into the ground, revealing the pipe beneath. “It really is filthy down there,”

“Relax, it’s just normal slime and moss,” Sophie chuckled with a fond roll of her eyes, casually swiping a finger along the filthy edge of the pipe. “Nothing disease worthy,”

“How do we get down?” Neville asked nervously as he peered down the dark pipe, biting his lip and gulping as he realised he couldn’t see the bottom.

Harry sighed, long resigned to the fact that he wasn’t going to be able to shake his three far too protective friends from coming with him.

“We ask nicely, that’s how,” Harry said decisively, before hissing: “ _Guardian-of-Hogwarts, are you there? I’d like to come down and talk to you, and some friends of mine would like to accompany me… if that’s alright?_ ”

There was a dead, echoing silence for a few moments, moments in which Harry was worried Sophie might actually jump down the pipe like a slide in her excitement if they didn’t get an answer fast enough… and then a familiar, deep hiss echoed up the tunnel.

“ _Of courssse little Harry. Friendsss of the Heir are asss welcome asss the Heir themssselvesss_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ ’s voice echoed through the bathroom, making everyone except Sophie start in alarm at the sudden hissing. “ _Give me a moment to come to you- I am on my way back from the foressst_ ,”

Harry blinked in surprise. _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had given him a brief overview of the contents of the Chamber on their way out the previous time he’d been there (and honestly, in his still somewhat traumatised state he hadn’t processed much of it), and he knew that the so called ‘hunting tunnel’ that led into the forbidden forest was pretty much on the opposite side of the Chamber from this exit into the castle.

Perhaps there was a charm of some sort on this tunnel that could convey a speaker’s voice to the basilisk no matter how far away she was? It would make sense, seeing as there wasn’t any other visible way down without risking breaking your neck. And it sounded just like the Salazar Slytherin to have to only safe way into his Chamber being reliant on a snake.

After a number of minutes in which none of them felt brave enough to speak, the familiar emerald scaled head of the basilisk emerged from the pipe to gasps of awe and apprehension from the children around it. Her eyes, thankfully, were safely lidded, as none of his friends seemed to have had the foresight to turn their own gazes away.

“She’s beautiful!” Sophie squeaked in amazement, sparkly love hearts figuratively shining in her eyes as the basilisk turned towards her curiously.

“ _She’s complimenting your looks_ ,” Harry translated with an exasperated smile, watching as the real basilisk preened at the praise just like the picture in ‘Fantastic Beasts’ had once done. “ _Sophie loves reptiles of any kind- the larger and more dangerous the better_ ,”

Theo and Neville, not sharing Sophie’s enthusiasm, looked equally apprehensive of the gigantic serpent but neither of them seemed willing to back down or turn away. Not even when she turned her curious gaze to them, though Theo quite visibly stiffened and Neville let out a soft squeak of his own.

“ _This is Theo_ ,” Harry gestured to the dark haired boy, who nodded stiffly to the snake upon recognising his ‘parseltongue-ified’ name from Harry’s lips. “ _And this is Neville_ ,”

Neville managed a shaky wave and a crooked smile as _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ tilted her head, looking over him.

“ _He remindsss me of Godric_ ,” the basilisk eventually stated, making Harry choke on air. “ _Give him a beard and longer braidsss and they could be nest-matesss_ ,”

“Harry? Harry, what is she saying?” Neville asked in a slightly tremulous voice, and Harry couldn’t help but let out a strangled laugh.

\-------

The Chamber of Secrets was just as dark, musty and filthy as the first time he’d been here, but this time, with four wands instead of none, they were able to banish the worst of the ancient rodent bones, slime and other mess with simple cleaning charms as they made their trek behind _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ through the catacombs towards the main chamber.

Thankfully, there was no sign of Quirrell’s tattered robes or wand, and Harry surmised that they must have deteriorated into mush after having been soaked in basilisk bile for so long. There certainly didn’t seem to be any house elves assigned to this long forgotten area of the castle that could have removed them.

“ _I mussst thank you for allowing me to hunt, little Harry_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ hissed to him as they made their way through the twisting tunnels. “ _There isss quite an infessstation of large ssspidersss in the foressst that I took great pleasssure in… reducing to sssafer numbersss. They will not feed on the habitantsss of Hogwartsss ever again_ ,”

Briefly, Harry wondered if these ‘large spiders’ happened to be the colony of acromantulas rumoured to live in the forest, and suddenly felt much better about allowing the basilisk free hunting privileges… privileges that, by the sounds of it, the most recent Heirs had denied to her, leaving her to long periods of hunger, hibernation and snapping up rodents now and then.

The no-longer-hungry basilisk seemed to have taken a greater liking to him as a result, and by extension, a liking to his three friends (thank goodness). She actually began hissing amiably back and forth with Sophie (with Harry acting as translator) once she brought up the possibility of becoming a parselmouth through learning rather than inheritance, hoping for more insight from the ancient snake than she’d been able to find through books.

“ _It isss a long and difficult path to tread, but it isss posssssible_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had kindly explained, much to Sophie’s delight upon hearing Harry’s translation. “ _It was how Sssalazar himssself came by the gift, after yearsss of ssstudy… and the real magic of the ssspeakersss isss that once you have learned, the knowledge will never truly be forgotten… not by you, or your dessscendantsss_ ,”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Sophie look so excited before,” Theo murmured in amazement to Neville as they trailed at the back of the group, and the Gryffindor snorted in reply.

\-------

Once they reached the Chamber of Secrets proper, stepping through the still-open parselmouth activated door from the catacombs, _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ paused for a moment and curled up in front of them, announcing that she needed to properly guide her ‘new Heir’ throughout the whole of the Chamber complex and that his friends were welcome to wait here if they so wished.

As expected, all three of them had insisted on coming with him.

And thus started probably one of the strangest half-hours of Harry’s life.

_Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ , while clearly trying to project a veneer of ancient wisdom and responsibility, was clearly excited to show off everything the Chamber had to offer.

“ _The lassst few Heirsss refusssed my guidance, either relying on their parentsss own mapsss…_ ,” the basilisk had sulkily admitted after a translated question on her clear excitability from Neville. “ _…or becaussse they were arrogant enough to believe they could dissscover everything by themssselvesss. I have not been able to do thisss in centuriesss_ ,”

And it was clear, not even five minutes into this little ‘tour’, that by disregarding _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ ’s advice, these previous Heirs had missed out on A LOT.

Besides the water-logged main hall with its fourteen great serpentine columns, the massive statue of Salazar Slytherin, the countless mossy murals along the walls-

(-the basilisk had insisted on coming back to look at those at the end of the ‘tour’ when Sophie had been momentarily distracted by a very lifelike carving of a hydra-)

-and the twisting, winding catacombs outside that apparently could be moulded to the will of an in-residence Heir to either confuse invading enemies or simplify the journey of allies-

(-if it turned out he truly was the Heir, Harry vowed to find out how to do so as soon as possible in order to shorten the current long, twisting journey back to the exit pipe-)

-there were eleven other rooms leading off from the main hall. Some were hidden and others were in plain sight, some opening only under very specific conditions and others giving way under the slightest touch.

The still-open mouth of Salazar Slytherin was by far the most obvious exit off the main chamber. It led to a large ‘nest’ of sorts for the basilisk, permanently heated to a comfortable temperature (as Harry had suspected) by a powerful rune-bound warming charm. The hunting tunnel out to the forbidden forest was connected directly to the nest, giving _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ an easy way to find food… so long as the Heir allowed her passage via their explicit spoken permission, otherwise the warded tunnel wouldn’t even open.

(Harry thought it rather unfair that he, or any other Heir for that matter, could so easily prevent the basilisk from hunting, but he supposed Slytherin had the safety of his students to think about back when he first built the Chamber. From what _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had implied, back then students regularly had lessons IN the forest… during which having a hungry basilisk slithering about would likely have been a bit of a liability)

The other more visible doorways back in the main hall led in turn to a sprawling emergency dormitory-

(-with over two-hundred beds in total, all of which required a good dusting-)

-a primitive kitchen with appliances sized for both wizard and house elf use-

(-but no remaining food supplies that hadn’t either been spoiled by water or by their preservation charms failing-)

-a bare stone room that _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ insisted had once been an armoury-

(-likely looted to its current barren state by previous Heirs centuries ago-)

-a set of VERY primitive bathrooms-

(-at least compared to the facilities in the castle above-)

-and of course, the primary exit into the so-called ‘patrolling tunnels’ that apparently honeycombed the entire castle above.

The less noticeable or accessible exits from the main hall, all of which required either a parseltongue password (all of which the basilisk freely offered up), a smear of Harry’s blood or specific permission to enter from _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ herself (or in one notable case, all three at once), all led to rooms in considerably better condition than these ‘public access’ areas… and in most cases were far more interesting to explore.

There had been a potions lab well stocked with a variety of equipment-

(-although most of the actual ingredients and potions stored on the shelves had either expired or dissolved into dust long ago-)

-a small library that had remained virtually untouched by time-

(- _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had cautioned them that the books were enchanted so they couldn’t be removed from the room, which explained why it hadn’t been looted like so many of the other rooms had been. Harry wondered if that book Voldemort had mentioned about auras was somewhere inside-)

-a large suite of bedrooms, studies and living spaces meant for the current Slytherin family’s personal use-

(-although much nicer than the emergency dormitory, it was clear these rooms hadn’t been in use for just as long-)

-the hatchery where _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had been born, which contained a worryingly large number of other exotic egg shell remains along the heated walls-

(-this was the room that had required all three permissions to enter-)

-an actual dungeon, with five individual cells and a bloody torture chamber to boot-

(-Harry was suddenly very glad that Voldemort had apparently been unaware of this particular set of rooms-)

-and, oddly enough, what was almost certainly a classroom, from how the basilisk had described it as ‘ _a place where little hatchlingsss come to receive the wisssdom of their eldersss_ ’. It bore a startling resemblance to the transfiguration classroom in the castle above, minus the windows (of course) and Professor McGonagall’s various personal additions.

The longer Harry and his friends stayed in the Chamber on their basilisk led tour, the brighter it seemed to get. The ever present greenish glow above (which Theo likened to the lighting of the Slytherin common room, which was filtered through the black lake) got stronger and stronger as _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ ’s tour continued, and Harry somehow doubted it was because it was reaching midday outside.

The Chamber no longer seemed like the dark, mysterious and intimidating place that Harry had woken up in the process of being tortured in not so long ago- if anything, it resembled the Hogwarts great hall more than it did some murky tomb. The ceiling wasn’t exactly enchanted to show the sky above, but it was now producing more than enough light… perhaps even enough for plants to grow.

(An idea bloomed in Harry’s mind… one that he carefully put aside for later perusal)

Eventually, having ‘oohed’ and ‘ahhed’ over every part of the ancient Chamber _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had guided them to, the four children and one basilisk reconvened in the main hall for a grave lecture.

“ _You may have already noticed thisss, but Sssalazar Ssslytherin built thisss Chamber not only asss a home for hisss family, but alssso asss a place of lassst resssort_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ began to recite what clearly was a long-memorised speech, allowing only brief pauses for Harry to translate to his friends. “ _If the ssschool isss in danger, he expectsss hisss Heir to open it for the other hatchlingssss above- either asss a place to wait out a sssiege… or asss a place to evacuate from. In such dire circumssstancesss, any hatchling of magical blood may find they can enter this place- even without the permissssion of an Heir or the tongue of a ssspeaker at their disssposal. Underssstood?_ ”

Harry, belatedly followed by his translation-delayed friends, nodded solemnly in understanding before the basilisk continued.

“ _Good. Now for happier mattersss…_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ proclaimed, turning and slithering over to one of the mural covered walls.

The Quiet Ones all followed the snake, Theo muttering confusedly under his breath to Neville the whole way. Something about Slytherin and muggleborn students and inaccurate myths? Neville was shaking his head and saying something to reassure him, but Harry’s divided attention was immediately drawn back to the basilisk as they stopped in front of a large, carved section of wall that had been hidden in the half-light when they’d first came in.

Now everything was brighter, it was clear to see that this was no ordinary mural… In fact, it almost looked like-

“ _Thessse are your ancessstorsss, little Harry_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ said proudly, gesturing to the massive, engraved family tree with her head. “ _Sssalazar’sss name liesss at the top, and continuesss to rissse asss hisss family growsss. Come, ssshow me where your name liesss…_ ,”

Harry couldn’t help but gape at the dozens- no, hundreds, of names inscribed by magic upon the wall. Sophie let out a low, impressed whistle at the sight and both Neville and Theo went silent as their gazes fell upon it.

“That’s…,” Theo said after an audible gulp. “That’s a LOT of Slytherins,”

“It’s even larger than the Longbottom family tapestry…,” Neville said faintly, sounding vaguely in awe at the sight.

“So it’s Salazar’s family tree then?” Sophie asked excitedly, and upon getting a distracted nod from Harry in answer, said: “Well, come on! Let’s find you!”

And with that, as Sophie leaned forward to start examining the lowest recorded names, the awe-like spell seemed to break and the three boys immediately joined her in her quest… if a little reluctantly in Harry’s case, who was still unconvinced that he might legitimately be of Slytherin’s blood- that his own name might be amongst the countless others on the tree.

(Despite his best efforts, Harry’s Uncle Padfoot still hadn’t turned up anybody even vaguely Slytherin related in the Potter family tree, as his last letter from St Mungo’s had bemoaned)

_Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ , whom clearly had no such doubts about her new ‘heir’s heritage, huffed in amusement and curled up neatly at one side to watch what would inevitably be a lengthy endeavour by the four first-year students.

After all, since the mural magically expanded every time any person with Salazar’s blood was born, there were a LOT of names to go through.

\-------

(“The decorations by some of these names seem deliberate…,”

“And repetitive. See? There’s a wand of some sort besides nearly all of the names up the top, but it gets rarer and rarer the further down the tree goes,”

“And the little snake by the names all but vanishes except through this- Hey! I know this name!”

“What, Marvolo Rapasin Gaunt?”

“Well, ‘Gaunt’ is an old wizarding name,”

“Do you know the family Theo? Harry?”

“I only know they died out a while ago. Edward- er, the man who taught me finance, he said they lost their entire fortune to mismanagement and later lost their bloodline to inbreeding,”

“So Marvolo must have been the last… no, wait, he had two kids with- ew, his own SISTER!”

“Not as uncommon as you might think Sophie, not back in those days. And that pretty much sums up what my father said about the Gaunt’s too. Never knew they had an unbroken magical connection to Slytherin’s line though…,”

“Unbroken or not, it’s still kind of gross Theo. Gran actually dragged my mum off to St Mungo’s for a blood relation test before she even let my dad buy a ring for her. Most purebloods at LEAST do that to prevent inbreeding today… marrying siblings together is just… eurgh,”

“Back to the tree for a minute, it looks like Marvolo’s son Morfin has a little wand and snake… but his daughter Merope only has a snake? _Guardian-of-Hogwarts, do you know what the snakes and wands by some of these names mean?_ ”

“Aw Harry, asking Sasha is cheating! Besides, isn’t it obvious?”

“Whatever it means, the wand came back for Merope’s chil- Oh,”

“Theo, what- Oh. OH,”

“…so this family tree also adds on personally chosen names as well as given names at birth. Er… good to know?”

“Well, I guess a moniker like ‘Lord Tom’ wouldn’t really appeal to anyone, let alone Him. Funny though, who’d have thought you-know-who’s dad was a muggle?”

“Oh, THAT’S what the wand means!”)

\-------

After a great deal of perusing names both known and unknown (and their unintentional distraction in finding Voldemort’s own family along the way) it ended up being Neville who eventually found Harry’s own little entry near the bottom of the elaborate tree.

Proudly flanked by both a wand and a snake, the name ‘Harry James Potter’ was rather unobtrusive, hidden in a sea of other familiar names… but they were not entirely the names they’d been expecting.

“Just so we’re all on the same page, wand means capable wizard or witch, and snake means parselmouth, right?” Neville clarified, looking a little bit faint at his discovery.

“That’s what I surmised,” Sophie agreed slowly, looking slightly stunned. “And Sasha agreed, so…,”

“…if nothing else, it explains those fantastic rumours that the Dark Lord was trying to recruit her so desperately at the end of the war,” Theo finished her sentence resignedly, rubbing his eyes before looking over the carving again. “I wonder if she even knew in life…?”

Harry could do little but continue to stare at the engravings, jaw hanging loose and eyes wide. There, just like in the charcoal sketched family tree Uncle Padfoot had scribbled out for him when he was eight years old, were the names of James Fleamont Potter and Lily Anne Potter nee Evans, connected to his by long thin lines.

But unlike the tree his godfather had drawn, his father’s name was alone and unsupported, adrift amidst a sea of Slytherin’s descendants. Here, it was his MOTHER’S snake and wand flanked name that connected itself to two wandless (yet one still stubbornly snake flanked) grandparents. These names again connected to several further snake edged names, and so on so forth until exactly seven generations higher, where the name ‘Isolde Petrona Prewett nee Gaunt’ was the last to possess a wand.

She was one of Salazar’s numerous great-great-grandchildren, and her eldest daughter ‘Monica Isolde’ had been born without magic… Harry’s direct ancestor though his mother.

“…I really AM related to Salazar,” Harry eventually managed to say, to which Theo snorted incredulously and Sophie let out a giggle.

“Harry, your blood was able to open the doors down here,” Neville pointed out wryly, only the faintest hint of nerves left in his voice. “I don’t think there was any real doubt. Your mum on the other hand… It’s almost unbelievable. How did nobody notice?”

Harry himself was having a harder time processing some of the other names attached to his mum’s. For according to the tree, ‘Petunia Mary Dursley nee Evans’ was also apparently a parselmouth (he barely remembered the screaming, slapping woman from his dementor induced early memories, but she hardly seemed the type to talk to snakes)… though he found himself inexplicably relieved that ‘Dudley Vernon Dursley’ had neither snake nor wand edging his carved name. From what little he remembered, Harry knew his estranged aunt and uncle would not react well to their own son being a parselmouth himself; or Merlin forbid, a WIZARD.

“ _Have you found your name?_ _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ suddenly asked, uncoiling from her position on the floor to poke her head over the four first years. “ _Ah, you are dessscended from a sssquib line. Not uncommon thessse daysss_ ,”

“ _Is that bad?_ ” Harry asked worriedly in reply, to which the basilisk shook her head.

“ _The return of magic to a barren bloodline isss alwaysss to be celebrated_ ,” she reassured him, looking pleased. “ _Now come. There isss one lassst thing I mussst disssscusss with you and your friendsss_ ,”

Somewhat reluctantly leaving the extensive family tree behind (Harry belatedly wondered just how many muggleborn students out there might have squib connections to Slytherin- there had been far more wandless names than not towards the bottom of the tree), the four Quiet Ones followed _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ back into the middle of the main hall. Harry could no longer pick out which carved column he had been bound against by Quirrell, which was probably for the best, and there wasn’t even a trace of a bloodstain wherever the possessed teacher had fallen.

Harry still had to supress a shudder, deliberately clearing his thoughts to think on happier things.

“ _Now, I have shown you the sssecretsss of the Chamber, and I have explained itsss higher purpossse in timesss of great need_ ,” _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ explained as they arranged themselves in a loose circle before her coiled bulk. “ _It now belongsss sssolely to you, until another Heir makesss their claim. You hold the keysss to the wardsss of thisss place, and can freely grant or ressstrict accessss to thossse you choossse. But there are two thingsss you cannot do. Firssst, you cannot purposssefully deny hatchlingsss accessss to the Chamber in timesss of danger. And sssecond, you cannot sssell, nor can you gift your ownerssship of the Chamber away. It, and everything within itsss wallsss, will remain the property Sssalazar’sss family eternally…it isss not for sssome proud headmassster or rich landowner to claim for themssselvesss. Underssstood?_ ”

Nodding hesitantly, Harry began to wonder maybe this was why the headmaster had been so insistent on a cover up. He’d seen some things in here that the ministry would LOVE to get their hands on if they thought they could dupe Harry out of it, not least the potions materials _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ ’s cold, dead body could provide. He couldn’t quite repress a shudder this time at that thought. But then again… how would the headmaster have known?

(Harry added yet another point to his worryingly quickly growing mental list of ‘things that are suspicious about Albus Dumbledore’, before dismissing the thought for later perusal)

Realising both his friends and the basilisk were waiting for his now-customary translation, Harry quickly repeated her speech in English before _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ moved on.

“ _That sssaid, you and thossse you choossse may come here at any time_ ,” the basilisk continued. “ _The extended presssence of an Heir gives life to the Chamber- and in the passst, many Heirsss were encouraged to add their own mark to thisss place_ ,”

The idea that had blossomed in the back of Harry’s mind earlier during the tour came to the forefront of his thoughts.

“ _I think I may already have an idea for that, actually…_ ,” Harry hesitantly offered. “ _If it’s alright with you?_ ”

_Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ , while as a snake she couldn’t exactly smile, seemed to radiate a sense of satisfied contentment at these words.

“ _Of courssse_ ,” she hissed with an enthusiastic nod. “ _And with that, that isss all I am bound to sssay. Come and visssit me often, little Harry. And bring your friendsss whenever you like_ ,”

\-------

(“Harry, permission to return to the Chamber to practice parseltongue with Sasha in the future?”

“Huh? Oh, sure! I doubt she’ll mind,”

“…dear Merlin, what am I going to tell my father about all of this?”

“The truth is probably the best Theo. Still, Harry’s mum being a parselmouth…,”

“It’s not that you aren’t a good teacher! You’ve been a great help over the last few months, it’s just- it’s just that she enunciates more like a snake than a human so I thought-,”

“*chuckles* Relax Sophie, its fine. I’m sure _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ will love the company. Besides, you can always communicate by parchment and ink if need be, I’m pretty sure she can read English even if she can’t understand the spoken language,”

“Actually, I don’t think my father would believe me about this even if I DID tell him,”

“About the Chamber, about the basilisk, about Harry’s mum or about Sophie learning how to become a parselmouth?”

“Oh! Great! Whew… You really aren’t… offended?”

“Of course not Sophie. _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ probably has a lot more experience than I’ll ever have with teaching, being as old as she is. Did either of you guys want to come back with us next time?”

“All of it. ALL of it. Hmm? Oh, er- well, Harry, it’d be nice to get another peek at that library… maybe after our exams are over though?”

“*sigh*… Oh to heck with it, why not? I’m sure Sasha knows all about the secret passageways in the castle. And I guess I wouldn’t mind a tour through those scouting tunnels…,”

“That’s the spirit Nev!”

“*smiles fondly* Thanks guys. For everything,”)

Four Quiet Ones bid farewell to a friendly basilisk and leave the Chamber of Secrets behind for the day.

Two purebloods, their already markedly changed world views challenged once more. A muggleborn, now more determined than ever to learn the secret tongue of Salazar Slytherin himself. And a half-blood, Heir of Slytherin, defeater of Voldemort and far beyond the silent child of Azkaban he had once been.

The seeds of friendship, planted so long ago during a train ride and budded through hours of dedicated time spent together, have now grown healthy and strong… and are now confirmed by this new secret that no others share.

In the castle around them students study for their exams, play games with their peers and speculate endlessly about the mundane gossip of the day.

The Quiet Ones emerge back into the light, and silently join the crowds of their year mates… with none the wiser as to where they have been, and what new secrets they now possess.

Life goes on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your wonderful comments and kudos, and merry Christmas to those who celebrate it! I'm posting a little early because the upcoming holidays are going to make me very busy, and I doubt I'll have time tomorrow. The very last chapter of this fic may be posted slightly early (or late) for the same reason, but with any luck it will be up by the 1st or 2nd of January at the latest.
> 
> For those who were debating last chapter, yes there are living descendants of Rowena Ravenclaw in this fic, and you'll eventually meet one of them (at which point it will be explained which of Rowena's children/grandchildren they are descended from and how). However, it will be a while until any other descendants of the founders show up; and I will confirm right now that none of the other Quiet Ones besides Harry are descendants themselves (no matter how much Neville might resemble Godric with his hair in warrior's braids according to the basilisk :) She's just a tad sentimental)  
> The other two immortal creatures of the founders may make themselves known slightly sooner however...
> 
> Next time: An epilogue of sorts... or, exams are the instruments of the devil, ancient libraries are a pain to translate, Harry does some covert gardening and we finally find out where Pettigrew went!


	20. Epilogue: Going Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Little snapshots of the end of Harry's first year of Hogwarts, and some hints towards the future...

**_The Exams…_ **

Exams, as Sophie had once so eloquently put it, were the instruments of the devil.

As the last few weeks of the school year were dedicated to the infinitely more important OWL and NEWT examinations, the first years were roped into both practical and theory assessments far sooner than their older peers, much to the disgruntlement of those with teasing elder siblings.

(At least they could takes solace in the fact that they could later, in turn, mock the panicking OWL and NEWT students once their tests came around)

The Quiet Ones, as expected, were probably the most prepared for said exams out of their year-mates… but it didn’t always feel that way in the final weeks, days and hours leading up to their tests.

(“Do you think we’ll have to list ALL of the ingredients for a forgetfulness potion, or would leaving some out show proof that our concoction worked?”

“Mouse into a snuff box. Mouse into a snuff box. Mouse into a… come to think of it, what even IS snuff? I don’t see why a normal box won’t do…,”

“There are two chapters on goblin wars in our textbook! TWO! Out of THIRTY-NINE! And Binns expected us to LEARN anything off that stupid goblin focused exam?!”

“Any bets on there being a lot of pineapple flavoured things on the house tables tonight? Professor Flitwick had a whole carton full of them for the practical,”)

But all said, compared to some of the other first years, Neville, Sophie, Theo and Harry ended up handling the stress quite well. For example…

…Draco Malfoy and Ronald Weasley getting caught attempting a wizard’s duel shortly after coming out of the first-year DADA exam…

…Lavender Brown half-dragging a hysterical Hermione Granger to the hospital wing for a calming draught after the charms practical…

…Michael Corner somehow managing to transfigure his only pair of shoes into a pair of bear traps in the Ravenclaw boy’s dorm while revising… ugh, don’t ask…

…Hannah Abbot and Susan Bones (both roommates of Sophie’s) somehow LOSING all of their combined years’ worth of notes for herbology just before the exam-!

-followed shortly by Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle ‘recovering’ said notes… and nearly having their own tests invalidated as a result before Hannah’s sheepish older brother confessed to the initial theft and hiding the notebooks in the dungeons (‘just a prank’ indeed…)

…all in all, it was a crazy few weeks during the Hogwarts exam period. (And that was just the first years!)

Before they knew it, the tests were over and they were free.

Free to enjoy the gradually warming weather, the pollen filling the air, the insects coming out in force to sing the buzzing songs of their people and the giant squid coming out of hibernation in the lake.

…

Suffice to say, Harry and Theo ended up spending most of this newfound free time either getting a head start on their holiday assignments in the library (dodging the attentions of increasingly frazzled OWL and NEWT students as best they could) or keeping _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ company down in the Chamber of Secrets.

Neville and Sophie, due to their plant and reptile/amphibian based interests respectively, spent slightly more time outside, clucking at their ‘indoors friends’ fondly whenever Theo or Harry all but hissed at the overwhelming sunlight and *shudder* NATURE. Heck, even flying didn’t seem all that appealing to Harry with all that eye-watering pollen in the air!

(Though in the end, via a lot of pleading, bargaining and, admittedly, some dragging, all four Quiet Ones managed to keep their time both indoors and outdoors fairly healthily matched)

\-------

**_Salazar’s Library…_ **

Deciphering the eclectic, and often misspelt, mix of old English, French, Spanish and various dialects of Norse books in Salazar’s private library was a tedious chore, but a rewarding one in the end.

Theo happened to be fluent in French himself (unlike Harry, whom had never been able to truly grasp the language despite Aunt Bella’s best efforts to the contrary), and also knew a number of handy translation charms for the written word that could easily overcome the multiple-time-and-language barriers.

(Although most of said charms only lasted about fifteen minutes at most per casting with their feeble, first-year magical reserves, and required hour-long breaks between attempts. It was a good thing both Harry and Theo were long practiced at speed-reading… and that both Neville and Sophie were able and willing to drag them both back outside in the event they became too frustrated with their slow progress)

In that last free week of school, while Theo absorbed himself in tomes detailing ancient spell research (and carefully put aside a number of old snake breeding texts where Sophie could easily find them), Harry instead busied himself with finding the books Voldemort had mentioned during his monologue… the ones in relation to passive auras in wizards and witches.

…it had been the one detail he’d always left out whenever telling the story of that dark February night, after all. That the Dark Lord had revealed the supposed existence of a passive magical aura around Harry.

Harry had had a feeling that such information wouldn’t have been very warmly received at the time of his initial interrogation, especially knowing as little about his so-called ‘aura of reason’ as he did. Many of the people present had been wary enough of his status as a parselmouth already thank-you-very-much; he didn’t want to reveal another apparently ‘rare’ power of his without first FULLY researching its true nature, history and scope of capabilities.

(And as for his friends… ugh, Harry winced every time he even THOUGHT about telling them. Just how is one supposed to say to the people they loved: ‘hey! I have this magical ability that’s probably been manipulating your thoughts and actions the entire time I’ve known you, I can’t control it, please don’t hate me?’ Their acceptance of his knowledge of parseltongue was one thing, but THAT…)

When Harry eventually found the relevant books, he’d been mentally preparing himself to discover the worst. To perhaps find out that his ‘aura’ was indeed a subset of the Imperius curse, or something even worse. To maybe discover that it drained the life of those around him, or had some other horrible side-effect. To possibly realise that Voldemort had been lying about so-called ‘passive auras’ entirely… or, perhaps worse, that He’d twisted a far more dangerous truth to lead Harry astray.

But when Harry had carefully opened the cover of the thick, old English book titled ‘Wizard-Kin Auras of Thee Passeve Nature’, and cast the now long-practiced translation spell under his breath…

‘ _…auras are fairly common in magic, and are usually found in correlation to enchantment. Objects imbued with magical properties can often (either deliberately, or as a side effect of other charms) exude passive auras around themselves that encourage certain simple feelings towards the item, such as antipathy, sympathy, greed, fear or desire._

_However, auras are not limited to inanimate objects. Indeed under certain circumstances wizard-kin can begin to generate passive auras of their own, ones that can project far more complicated emotions; or even abstract concepts that can have a variety of effects of those around them…_ ’

…word for word, the opening page of the book practically replicated the Dark Lord’s own explanation for passive auras. Harry felt himself let out a deep, relieved breath, and he leaned back in his soft, dusty chair as the worst of his unfounded worries were finally quashed.

And then he leaned forward again over the book, determined not to waste his remaining ten minutes of translation time.

He was going to learn everything he could about this aura of his, and he was going to bloody well take advantage of it!

\-------

**_Questionable Loyalties and Moaning Ghosts…_ **

Harry kept writing back and forth with Sirius as the end of the year approached, trying to figure out just where they were going to be staying over the summer.

(Uncle Padfoot kept offhandedly mentioning a London townhouse and employing some cursebreakers (?!), but otherwise he seemed determined to keep the exact nature of their new home a secret until the moment his godson stepped off the train)

He also, to a much more censored degree, kept up his correspondence with the folk of the northern tower… though he had a feeling that through his and Sirius’s suggestive letters combined, their ex-cell mates had a good idea of exactly what had happened back in February.

_‘Sirius spontaneously sent me a new blanket, as per that bet we made five years ago, so I have a pretty good idea of what happened. By the way, thanks again for all the other blankets you sent at Christmas! Don’t tell Sirius, but they’re WAY more comfortable than the one he just sent –Antonin_

_You never said, how ARE the snakes at Hogwarts? I guess there aren’t as many as there are here due to the wards keeping venomous creatures confined to the forbidden forest, but you hinted you met quite a large one lately? Is it friendly? –Edward_

_I will admit I am a little conflicted over Sirius’s admittance you got a detention recently- and for sneaking out on the night the Defence teacher went missing no less! From what he described, I’m willing to believe it may be related to that curse I mentioned- or to the one who laid it. Stay safe, you hear me Harry? –Augustus_

_I hear from Sirius that you’ve discovered the… inspiration behind that technique I taught you to scare off any ‘overly interested purebloods’. Perhaps now you can see what makes it so effective! …jokes aside, I am glad that you emerged from this revelation unscathed. I dearly wish that any future encounters of this sort will be more peaceful, as vain as I’m aware that hope may be. Remember that power respects power, dear Harry, and I’m confident that you can become VERY powerful… if you so desire to be –your Aunt Bella’_

The most recent letters Harry had received from Azkaban were long and involved, with cryptic reassurances and coded questions galore from nearly everyone… and he couldn’t help but worry.

After having been waiting and hoping for so long (-perhaps in vain, they’d thought, judging by how the Dark Mark had been ever steadily fading on their arms year after year-) his old cell-mates now had confirmation that their lord was alive and active.

And yet they had still refused to cut ties with him or Sirius, just as Harry knew in turn that he couldn’t- wouldn’t- simply cut his ties with any of them… even if Voldemort returned to life somewhat more permanently.

It was encouraging.

It was terrifying.

It was a dilemma, one that might grow too great to overlook should the Dark Lord ever think to rescue his Death Eaters from Azkaban. Their loyalties were clearly split- tied to their sworn master by their beliefs, faith and actions… and yet sympathetic to the plight of the boy-who-lived and his guardian through their shared hardship in the prison for close to a decade.

Voldemort had been ready and willing to kill Harry only months before just to eliminate such a complication, citing the long-term effects Harry’s aura ‘might’ have had on his imprisoned followers. What would he do to Death Eaters that continued to so openly and freely admit their attachment to members of the so-called ‘light side’?

(Harry tried not to think too deeply about it, lest he call back old nightmares)

The whole situation made Harry frustrated, made him think of that impossible image he’d once glimpsed in the mirror of Erised… Why couldn’t both sides just be reasonable and simply get along?

_Reason. Peace. Silence and cherries. Icy cold and thick, musty dog fur._

_A seedling amidst the stones._

_A child amidst torturers, spies and assassins._

…deep down, Harry knew that it wasn’t that simple. Azkaban, the northern tower… it was but a tiny corner of a much larger world that could never truly be swayed; not by his presence and newly named aura alone.

It was thinking these pensive thoughts, the most recent letter from Azkaban clutched in one hand and a small parchment package in the other, that Harry approached the second-floor girl’s bathroom on the last day of term. Alone.

“This is a GIRL’S bathroom, you know,” a whiny, exasperated voice startled Harry just as he closed the ‘out-of-order’ marked door behind him. “YOU’RE not a girl, and neither are half your friends!”

Barely managing not to jump in alarm, Harry turned abruptly to come face to face with the ghost of an older girl. She wore thick, clunky glasses even in death, her hair was done up in a pair of unflattering pigtails, and she was wearing an old fashioned, Ravenclaw embossed robe. Perhaps a third or fourth year student at the time of her demise.

“Oh! Hello- er, sorry, I’m just passing through Miss…?” Harry managed to blurt out in a fairly coherent fashion.

“Warren. Myrtle Warren,” the ghost sniffed. “But everyone calls me Moaning Myrtle,”

Harry just blinked for a moment, processing this information. Sophie had told him about the rumours of ghosts in this closed bathroom, which was why there was rarely ever anyone inside to witness their travels to and from the Chamber… but he’d never actually expected to meet said ghost.

“Ah well, Myrtle- may I call you Myrtle?- I apologise for trespassing, but I really am just passing through. There’s a secret passage in this bathroom my friends and I often use,” Harry quickly explained, trying to sound as polite as possible.

“Oh, I KNOW about that,” Myrtle pouted dismissively. “It’s not all THAT secret. Since I stay in this bathroom ALL the time it’s hard to miss you lot coming and going,”

“Um… you can come down and explore if you’d like?” Harry reluctantly offered, wondering if ghosts actually needed permission to come down into the Chamber of Secrets. “Just… er, be loud enough that _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ knows you’re there? I’m not sure what effect her gaze might have on the undead…,”

Now it was Myrtle’s turn to blink blankly at him for a moment.

“…the giant snake?” she asked hesitantly.

“The giant snake,” Harry confirmed, awkwardly rubbing his head. “I don’t think she’d mind the company honestly, especially since the rest of us are going home for the holidays tomorrow,”

Myrtle just stared at him in silent bewilderment, and Harry took this as an opportunity to slowly shuffle over to the sink where the pipe was concealed, hissing a quick ‘ _open_ ’. A long, long, LONG silken ladder was now fixed to the opening with a strong sticking charm. It had been acquired and attached by Neville at some point after their fourth visit to the Chamber; a ‘back-up’ method, as he’d nervously put it, for entering and exiting in case the basilisk was unavailable or they otherwise didn’t want to bother her.

_Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had praised Neville’s ingenuity (Harry had the sneaking suspicion that if she hadn’t, the ladder wouldn’t have remained stuck as firmly as it was) and now there was no real need for him to call the snake every time any of them wanted to venture down.

Harry briefly turned back to look at the still-staring Myrtle before he pushed the letter and parcel he was carrying into his pockets, took hold of the ladder and swung himself over the not-quite vertical pipe.

“Coming?” he asked one final time, taking a pointed step down the swaying ladder.

Myrtle seemed to hesitate for a moment… but she hovered after him down the pipe none the less.

After climbing/crawling for a while down the tunnel (interspersed with comments from Myrtle about the dark and the dirt) they eventually made it to the bottom, and emerged into the catacombs below.

Harry had decided by this point that Myrtle Warren seemed like a nice enough ghost (if one severely lacking in self-esteem), and he had no problems leaving her to her fascinated exploration of the honeycomb of passageways around them-

(-‘even if there IS slime, it’s still much larger than my bathroom’, she’d haughtily proclaimed, poorly hiding her clear enthusiasm. Harry could see why she’d been sorted Ravenclaw-)

-while he continued on to the main chamber.

_Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ was nowhere to be seen when he entered the column-lined hall, but that was alright. They’d already said their formal goodbyes for the summer yesterday, and he’d already discussed this particular… experiment with her while his friends had been out of earshot.

(He wasn’t taking any risks on them finding out the surprise, parseltongue or no. Even if Sophie was still hopeless at actually speaking the tongue of snakes, she could now easily decipher some of the more common words)

Thankfully, _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ had fully agreed to Harry’s plan. Seemed quite excited about it even.

Letting out a deep, slow breath, Harry centred himself and walked to the middle of the now brightly lit hall, withdrawing the parcel from his pockets once again.

Harry took a final look around, drew his wand, and painted a wide circle onto the ground with a simple colouring charm so _Guardian-of-Hogwarts_ knew to avoid the spot.

And then, he unwrapped the parchment parcel, one he’d carried with him all the way from Azkaban.

It was full of cherry pits.

\-------

**_The Long Train-Ride Home…_ **

“Malfoy is being insufferable. AGAIN,” Theo groaned as he shut the compartment door behind him. “I can’t even imagine whether he’d be better or worse if he’d actually come first in the exam rankings rather than second,”

“He’s complaining about being beaten by Hermione again, am I right?” Harry asked dryly, getting a dour nod of confirmation from Theo that made Neville chuckle.

“I don’t see why the rankings are so important,” Sophie huffed from her seat, not even looking up from the reptile section of ‘Fantastic Beasts’ to do so. “All that matters is if you pass or fail at this stage, not who’s behind or in front of you,”

“I don’t know, my Gran’s probably going to be happy I scored so high,” Neville said cheerily, Trevor the toad safely contained in a basket by his side. “I’ve never been in the top ten of anything before coming to Hogwarts!”

They’d gotten their exam results at the very end of the previous day after the farewell feast-

(-in which the house elves had, of course, gone just as overboard as they had at the welcoming feast. Everything had been Slytherin-themed for their win of the house cup, so there’d been a lot of green-and-silver dyed/charmed foodstuff about-)

-and all four Quiet Ones had in fact made it into the top ten ranking spots in their year. Theo had the highest placing at five, Sophie next at seven, Neville at eight and Harry exactly number ten.

(They’d all joked about how the Ravenclaw in the group had gotten the lowest scores, and Harry had taken it all in good fun. He’d kind of been expecting it after all, it wasn’t like he really had a favoured subject like the rest of his friends to bump up his marks that little extra bit. Besides, making the top ten was still making the top ten, regardless of his friend’s placements)

“Do you think we’ll be able to visit each other over the summer?” Sophie innocently asked, immediately garnering winces from both Theo and Neville.

“My father isn’t exactly-,” Theo started.

“Gran doesn’t really like to-,” Neville spoke at the same time.

There was a bit of mutual spluttering, stopping and starting until Harry interrupted them with:

“How about we all plan to meet up in Diagon Alley at some point after the book lists come out?” he suggested, pointedly NOT thinking about how his last few trips to Diagon had ended. He’d adjusted to his magic sense now! He had!

“Sounds good,” Neville agreed in clear relief, Theo letting out a similarly relieved breath as he nodded.

“My parents were planning to take me on the fifteenth of August, is that a good time for the rest of you?” Sophie asked, finally bookmarking ‘Fantastic Beasts’ and looking up at her friends.

“I think I’ll be able to make it then,” Harry confirmed with a nod, thinking about the holiday plans (or lack thereof) that Sirius had shared with him.

“I should be able to convince my father to let me go on that date,” Theo answered formally, the barest hint of nerves in his voice. “Although I may be taking Odette with me. I’ll owl you to confirm,”

“Same here,” Neville said a bit awkwardly. “If I can’t get Gran to take me then, I might still be able to convince Uncle Algie,”

“Send a lot of letters, okay?” Sophie asked- or more like commanded- all of the boys with a very serious look on her face. “My older brother and sister still don’t believe I have warm-blooded friends and I want to rub it in their faces, okay?”

They all laughed at that, and from there the conversation tapered off as they all unsurprisingly got out books to read for the rest of the long journey back to King’s Cross.

Sophie continued to peruse ‘Fantastic Beasts’, seemingly committing every vaguely reptilian entry to memory. Theo casually browsed through the muggle history book on World War II she’d given him for Christmas. Harry started on ‘The Call of Cthullu’ in his long-neglected Lovecraft compilation, and more than once was reminded of the giant squid in the black lake. And Neville, of course, was happily absorbed into an older edition of the NEWT-level herbology textbook he’d gotten from Professor Sprout.

The silence was comfortable, and wrapped them all up like warm, familiar blanket.

They’d have to return to the relative noise of reality soon enough, but for now… now they could be as quiet as they liked.

…

…

…

(Deep underneath Hogwarts, where a basilisk sleeps and a curious ghost wanders, a tiny green shoot sprouts in between the cracked paving stones)

\-------

**_And the Future…?_ **

Meanwhile, somewhere out in the country, inside a dilapidated, isolated house covered in wards and with far too many locks on the basement door…

Where an ever-growing stack of untouched, unopened letters and parcels addressed to one Moony lie gathering dust on the kitchen table…

“So, let me summarise our situation,” Peter Pettigrew muttered wearily, folding his arms over one of the many piles of envelopes. “We have one safe house. A house warded heavily enough to keep in a transformed werewolf I’ll admit, but ONE house. We have said werewolf, who hates me, you and everything we both stand for, locked in the basement of our ONE house. He’s tied to the wards- so if he dies, they’ll fry us both- he can’t be held with the Imperius curse for longer than a few minutes and I’m starting to doubt I’ll ever be able to persuade him to join us,”

He sighed heavily, almost mournfully at this, then continued.

“We have the disgraced former head of the DMLE and, more recently, the DIMC, drugged up to his eyeballs on wit-dampening potions and under the Imperius 24-7; his mind is probably already turned halfway to mush through mind you-,” Pettigrew rolled his eyes at the expression of smug satisfaction on his conversation partner’s face. “-of course you don’t think that’s a negative, never mind. We have ONE terrified house elf, ONE functional wand, limited funds and supplies, and likely the whole of the British wizarding community looking both for me and for your sperm donor of a father… And you think, despite ALL of these disadvantages, that we can actually find and resurrect the Dark Lord?”

“Yes,” Barty Crouch Junior stated undeterred over on the other side of the table, looking the other man dead in the eye. “Now are you in, or out?”

Peter let out a frustrated groan and put his head in his hands.

“Sure, why not?” he mumbled into his palms. “It’s not like I had any other plans for this weekend,”

 

 

**_NEXT IN THE QUIET ONES SERIES: THE BOY IN THE BOOK_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's a wrap for the first fic in this series!
> 
> Thank you so much to all the readers who have read along as I've posted this, and for all the lovely kudos and comments you've left! And both thanks and credit to J.K. Rowling for writing the original Harry Potter series, without which this fic would never have been written.
> 
> I have the next fic in this series (The Boy in the Book) partially written already, and assuming I don't get horribly distracted by all of the other unrelated ideas for fics swimming around in my head, I will start posting that sometime in February 2019. (And yes, in the very first chapter you'll find out more about what's happening with Pettigrew, Lupin and Crouch. Hehe, sorry for the cliffhanger :) In my defence, I DID say that Remus had a very good reason for not contacting Sirius! Being kidnapped counts I hope?)
> 
> Seeing as I will be essentially offline for most of January, I'll do my best to answer any comments made on this chapter in the next few days (although probably with a few hours time delay at least). Hope you all enjoyed this fanfiction!

**Author's Note:**

> I hope to update this every two weeks.  
> More tags will be added as chapters are posted to avoid too many spoilers.  
> Hope you found it interesting! :)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Aries Black and the Chamber of Secrets (Pending Extensive Re-write)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17099918) by [The_MorRioghain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_MorRioghain/pseuds/The_MorRioghain)




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